So, I don't have updates for the past week. I'm actually back in the states. No, it hasn't been 2 years already. I left early. Peace Corps is a wonderful organization with an admirable purpose, but it didn't feel like the right place (or time, I guess) for me. Bolivia is also a beautiful country (what I saw of it) and anyone who's planning a vacation should definitely consider going there. That being said, I have no idea what I'm going to do now. Grad school most likely. And I'm changing the title of this blog and I probably won't be updating it anymore since there won't be anything too exciting to report. Moreover, it is much easier to call me now and I can check email regularly. So, keep in touch and all the best to all of you!

More classes. Although we made guacamole in Spanish class, so there was a nice snack. Also, I have noticed that it is becoming easier to think in Spanish, rather than thinking of the English word and then translating that into Spanish. Which I think is very cool.

In the afternoon we did more work on our latrine. We poured in the concrete for the slabs and it should be dry in a couple of days. We also made a teeny tiny mistake. For extra stability, we made a frame of rebar for the concrete slab. We had finished pouring the concrete and were ready to leave when Sara picked up the frame and said, “Isn’t this supposed to be in the concrete?” Yes, yes it was. Luckily the concrete wasn’t too dry yet so we just jammed it in there and smoothed the concrete over it. Hope it works!

This evening we watched ‘Volver’ for Spanish class. I brought this chocolate drink called chicolat, which is delicious. It comes in little bags, which is funny. A lot of the dairy drinks come in bags, even yogurt. The yogurt is a little thinner than the yogurt in the States though, which makes it possible to drink from a bag. I also brought Oreos, yum! The only problem was that the movie was in Spanish with Spanish subtitles. It would have been ok, but the actors spoke extremely fast. It was a good movie, but very confusing and I’m not sure if I got the plot right. Oh well, we’ll discuss it on Monday in class.

More classes, blah! Although I did go to Quillacollo in the afternoon since classes got out early. Most of the big markets were closed. I wasn’t sure if it was the day or the time. I did buy some nice postcards with some pictures of Bolivia. I haven’t been to any of the places yet, but they’re still pretty. Moreover, I bargained for too, yahoo! I also bought a couple of DVDs, though I don’t know if they’ll work in my computer. However, they cost 10 Bs which is $1.25, so if they don’t work, it’s not a huge deal. Just something to entertain myself with after everyone is asleep.

Classes in Cochabamba today – and more vaccines! Typhoid and the second rabies shot this time. Things are pretty much routine now. During one of the afternoon classes I learned to knit! It’s kind of fun. The volunteer who taught me was half of a lovely older couple who are volunteering in Integrated Education. She’s really good. I’m going to try to buy a couple of knitting needles so that she can teach me more. I know how to cast and the basic knitting stitch.

We went out in the evening to a restaurant in Cochabamba (since we were already there). The waiting staff looked petrified when all forty of us walked in. But it was great. The service was slower because there were so many of us, but the food was amazing. I had a cheese quesadilla. Mmmmmm, cheese! I think that’s the first time I’ve had cheese since being here. Mostly what we get is a locally prepared cheese called quesilla. We were told not to eat it since the preparation is kind of icky. People might not wash their hands much, even after going to the bathroom. Also the milk might be straight from the cow and not pasteurized, so Dr. Death told us not to eat it. Dr. Death is the medical guy who tells us what not to eat so we don’t get really sick or die. It’s very nice of him to do so, but it seems that the only safe thing to do is go back to the U.S. every time you want to eat a real meal. :) Anyways, things are still going good. Talk to you later!

Guess what we did today??? More classes! Things have pretty much settled into a routine here - language class in the morning, some other class in the evening. We went to Quillacollo to check out the veggie market and find out prices and where they were grown. It was funny because most of these women selling the veggies speak a mix of Quechua and Spanish. We speak no Quechua. Well, except for ‘Wen dia’ which is equivalent to ‘Buenos dias’ in Spanish. For the afternoon class we divided up into groups and had mini charlas (charlitas) with some of the host families that volunteered to do these charlitas. I was with my neighbor who talked about vegetarianism in Bolivia. Sounds like that will become a bit of a challenge when we move to our sites in the campo. It was still light out when we finished so I was able to take a shower, yay! I can hear some of you going ‘ewww! You don’t shower everyday???’ Well, no. This is because of a lot of things. My family is trying to charge me 2 Bs. Per shower, even though the water is not heated with electricity and is therefore not a significant contribution to their household expenses. Also, the light in the bathroom does not work so it’s kind of spooky (Vitha, spooooky!) in there at night. Also I can’t shower in the mornings because it’s so cold, I will catch pneumonia. It’s a battle just to get myself to wash my face every morning, that’s how cold the water from the sink is. So there you have it, my incomplete list of reasons why one shouldn’t shower daily while in Bolivia during the winter. I guess that’s it for today. We have classes at the training center tomorrow in Cochabamba (my mom likes saying that name) so hopefully I’ll get to an internet café to do some posting. Ciao amigos!

Today was pretty nice. I had a full day off in which I planned to do so many things – wash my clothes, clean my room, buy some groceries. I did none of these things (oops!). I woke up late around 8:30 am, which is late around here, especially when your family has been banging around since 5 am. Then I went over to Sarah’s house because she had said that she wanted to find an internet café. Since I had been to Quillacollo and had found a really good one, I told her I’d go with her. So we left our houses around 10:15 and walked. It’s a pretty long walk. We finally made it to the main road around 11 and decided not to go all the way to Quillacollo and just stop at the next internet café we saw – which turned out to be a block away. It was a decent one, not as good as the one I’d been to in Quillacollo, but still quite serviceable. I got a chance to talk to my parents, which was nice. So we hung out there for a couple of hours, listening to the Kabhi Kushi Kabhi Gham (sp?) soundtrack.

In the afternoon, I went back to Quillacollo just because my house was empty and I had nothing to do. I went with my neighbors. When we got there they had closed off the street for a giant party. For those of you in Sioux City, it looked like Saturday in the Park. They had a band playing and food all over the place. They also had people selling their artwork in the street (which is kind of normal anyways). After walking through the fair, we bought a litre of ice cream to share and sat and ate it on a park bench. They also had those jumping things where they pump air in and kids can jump really high. It was fun to watch. In the evening we tried to watch Troy (or Troya in Spanish). It was funny because it was obviously a pirated version and people in the movie kept getting up and leaving the theatre. I guess the movie wasn’t as popular in Bolivia!

At 8:30 we had Spanish class as usual. This week it was at Sarah’s house and she went all out for breakfast. We had a fruit plate and real coffee from her coffee press. You might think that since Bolivia is part of South America we would have excellent coffee. Unfortunately that’s completely untrue. All the coffee in Bolivia is imported from other countries, and most of it does not taste that great. So having real thick aromatic coffee from Sarah’s coffee press was a huge deal. Real coffee, yummm! And yes I fell off the non-coffee wagon. How could I not? It smelled so good!

Our technical class this afternoon finally got a bit interesting. We started constructing a baño ecológico. I had no clue about anything but a lot of people were in the same boat so they took their time to teach us. First we had to level out the area where the baño would be built which meant clearing the area of guinea pig poop and grass. Apparently if you construct the foundation over organic material it’s a bad thing since the foundation will shift. Then we placed rocks over the leveled area for some reason that I’m not sure of yet. Meanwhile we started cutting rebar (sp?) and tying them together. This is what the concrete gets poured over for the bottom of the latrine. It provides a frame of sorts (I think). Two compartments will sit on top of the foundation and above that is the actual bathroom. So once the latrine is constructed they will have to climb about 3 steps to go to the bathroom. Another group got started on the floor level of the latrine which consists of two squares of concrete with holes in the middle. Why two holes? Because the toilet goes over one hole while the fecal material under the other hole composts. You have to keep changing which toilet the hole goes over so that you don’t have an overflow of the compartments below. Hopefully this was somewhat clear. If not, don’t worry, I have pictures!

One last thing – I have to comment on one of the dinamicos (icebreakers). It was all about counting our blessings using a point system. Some of the blessings were funny. After being alive and healthy (10 points), the blessings that counted the most were having regular sex and regular bowel movements. Both of those got 8 points. Having living parents was only 4 points. Interesting!

Today we went to Quillacollo on our own. It was interesting and empowering to know that I could get on a bus and get where I needed to go in one piece. I know I’ve been comparing here to India a lot, but the buses are different. First there are fifty different kinds of buses. I’m not kidding, there are a lot. Then, people don’t generally hang out of the buses. Some buses in India are stuffed so full, the bus starts to lean to one side or the other. Moreover there are people hanging in the doorways and they look like they’re about to fall out. There isn’t any of that here (as far as I’ve seen). When buses are full, people usually don’t try to cram on. That isn’t to say that the buses can’t get full. It gets pretty crowded in there sometimes. The type of bus that I’ve been taking mostly is called a trufi. It looks like a minivan, so there are doors to close and whatnot, hence, no people hanging out the doors. Anyways I went to an internet café in Quillacollo and updated stuff, including my blog (yay!).

In the afternoon, we had our rescheduled charla (group discussion) from Friday. It was rescheduled because of the paro civico. My host sister came along with me. The charla was about trash – the dangers of littering and the benefits of recycling. My host sister seemed interested, so hopefully when I bring up my worm bin assignment she will be open to it. We played a little game where everyone was given a picture and they had to explain their picture (in any language) and place it in a category. I don’t remember all the categories, sorry! After that they taught us how to crochet with plastic bags. It was really cool since I didn’t know how to crochet. Now I know! They had examples with them of some very pretty purses that had been made with recycled plastic bags. At this point, our host family members went home and our training started. The main point of the lesson was how to involve the community and motivate them to do our projects. We learned about dynamicos (sp?) which are what we call ice breakers in English. We did one that was like telephone and the message was about plastic recycling. It turned out exactly like it did when we played when we were little, except the message was even more garbled since it was in Spanish. I don’t think the coordinators took our varying levels of Spanish into account since most of the novice speakers ended up on the same team. It was hilarious to hear their end message. Then we played freeze tag and said that the catcher was a contaminated droplet. The lesson was that it is very easy to spread contamination. It worked since the game was over in less than two minutes!

I think that a lot of people reading this blog may think, ‘Hey! Aren’t you supposed to be working hard?’ Actually, I was thinking this too. Despite the hectic schedule, this has been more like a fun summer camp than anything else. And next week, we start constructing our first ‘baño ecologico’! After training one of the trainers drove us all back in the Land Cruiser. And when I say all of us I mean 15 people. The trainer told us it was good practice for traveling around Bolivia. It was pretty comfortable!

The last is the courtyard in my host family´s house. I took the picture from the door of my room. The gate is the gate out of the house. As soon as you step outside that gate you are surrounded by spinach and fruit trees. Actually I found chou-chous in the neighbor´s yard. I don´t know the word in English so I was confusing everyone, but they forgave me I think :)

The fourth is the view of my open room door from the entrance of the house. You can see the courtyard from the other side. It´s pretty cool right?

The third picture is of my bed. Yes, I sleep under a giant green mosquito net, 2 wool blankets, and a sleeping bag rated for 30 degrees F. It´s quite cozy and free of mosquitos. Of course the first couple of nights I would wake up and freak out about the net, but not anymore!

The second picture is of the Saint Isidore Labrador parade I described in the post before last. It was a nice parade and everyone got covered with paper confetti.

The first picture is of the dancers in the saint parade on May 15th. I think they were dressed as turkeys but I´m not sure. They looked really neat though.

Also, as I´m sitting in this internet cafe in the city (Quillacollo) another Saint Isidore Labrador parade went by though it was smaller.

So yesterday was a lot of fun. Originally we had planned to go into Quillacollo to get on the internet and look around a bit. But because of the paro civico, Peace Corps told us that we were not allowed to go to the city. Our classes were cancelled as well, which was nice since we’ve been pretty busy since they started. But we had other plans, so it was ok.

We watched El Diamonte de Sangre with Spanish subtitles. Most of us disliked dubbed voices so the speaking was still in English. It was an assignment for class (yet another reason why Liesbeth is the greatest Spanish teacher in Bolivia). We made pipocas the old fashioned way – over a stove - and had Coke to drink. There was a moment of hilarity when we offered the Coke to Sarah’s host brother and he refused vehemently, thinking that we were offering him coca (used to make cocaine). He was shocked that we would drink such a thing. Of course we tried to explain with our limited Spanish that it was refresca, not drugs and I think he understood, or at least I hope he did. The movie was especially funny for its comment on the Peace Corps. Those of you who have seen it may remember the part where Leonardo DiCaprio first meets Jennifer Connely and mistakes her for a Peace Corps volunteer. He says that Peace Corps volunteers only stay long enough to realize that there’s nothing that they can do – or something to that effect. Ruben (Sarah’s host brother) got a big kick out of that. We’re hoping to make the movie a weekly thing. We’re going to ask Liesbeth for a funny movie next time – one without so much violence.

In the evening we went to a fiesta in Illataco with other Peace Corps Trainees. I thought it was going to be an actual party, but it was just us volunteers. It was still fun though. We got to see people that we usually don’t see on a daily basis. The way housing is set up, we are split into two sections. I live in the Matenda/Chulla section and the second group lives in the Florida/Illataco section. It’s about a 20 minute walk between the two closest people from each group. Between the two farthest volunteers, it’s about an hour’s walk. Since we have classes from 8:30 to 6 most days, we don’t really have time to go see the other group during the week. Anyways, last night was a blast. The tienda we sat at had a foosball table so we played that for awhile. Sarah was really gung-ho about it. She beat all of us but then the 5-year-old kid who lives there beat her. It was pretty funny. I got home a little later than curfew but everyone in the house was asleep already so it wasn’t a big deal.

Again, I love hearing from you guys so let me know how things are going in your lives!

Ok, so this is a picture of my fellow B-45 Basic Sanitation Voluteers. It was taken outside the airport in Cochabamba. The older guy in the bottom left corner is Tim, the guy who does technical training. I´m not sure what his title is exactly. Probably yet another acronym. Peace Corps is all about the acronyms. So, I’m an awful blogger. I haven’t updated in such a long time. Lo siento mucho. Since I last posted, we’ve started training and have been living with our host families for almost a week. I live in a suburb of Cochabamba called Lorocalle/ Matenda. I’m not really sure which since the zones aren’t well defined. Either way I’m about a 45 minute bus ride from the city. My host family is very small (just a mother and her daughter) and very hospitable. The house reminds me of those I’ve seen in India. There’s a courtyard in the middle and all the rooms surround it. I’ll try to post pictures so you can see what I’m talking about. The house is surrounded by gardens. These gardens are HUGE! There’s spinach, roses, pomegranates, mandarinos (no sé la equivalente en ingles), and many other fruits and veggies. It’s great fun. Also, the mountains are so close and they make the perfect backdrop for this lovely community. My fellow volunteers are all living pretty close. In fact, two (a married couple) live right across the street with the brother of my host mother and another lives next door (no relation). Of course there are several gardens and a flower farm between our houses. I have a hot shower that’s heated by solar panels and a flush toilet. I really enjoy this since it’s quite unlikely that I will have either at my work site. I also enjoy having my fellow volunteers close by. We are able to talk in English once in awhile and chat about our homes and how things are going.

Training is also going quite well. Me encanta mi clase de español. My teacher, Liesbeth is excellent and very adventuresome. We went to La Concha on Tuesday, which is the giant marketplace in Cochabamba, sort of like Ranganathan Street in Chennai. We went by bus. I bought a present for my mom, which I will not disclose here since she reads this, and some laundry soap. Yes, we wash clothes by hand. It should be fun (I think). Lisebeth is a kindred spirit and took us for ice cream at Dumbo’s (as in the Disney character) and then made us panqueques yesterday morning while pointing out the kitchen things in Spanish. My class consists of Anna S., Anna O., and Sarah N., who, incidentally, is my neighbor. They are also all Basic San volunteers. We knew class would be excellent when la maestra gave us chocolate as a reward during the first class.

We also have culture, safety, medical, and technical classes. I have to say I was not so enthusiastic about my first technical class. We made flycatchers with plastic bottles and raw meat (ewww!). The other project was to make a worm bin. This was kind of cool in theory. What you do is you start a compost pile in a trash bin with worms. The worms produce humus which can be used as fertilizer once you harvest it. This is particularly useful since most of the people here have gardens. Again, it’s kind of gross. Our assignment for technical training during these three months is to convince our family to make worm bins and then help them do so. We also have a recycling project which is less important since the majority of the community already recycles. I hope we discuss more projects with education since that’s what I’m interested in.

Medical classes are fun since we’re learning about all the different diseases we can get. One class was all about diarrhea and dysentery. Sounds fun, right? The other class we learned about Chagas and the vinchuca bugs. These classes are the reason that we sleep in giant mosquito nets. Safety classes are kind of scary. They tend to make everyone paranoid and I think no one feels safe walking out at night, even in groups. It’s seems unjustified since everyone is really friendly and everyone is related to everyone else. Chances are that if you walk down your street, your whole family will be watching you from the windows. Hopefully this will go away since it gets dark around 6 pm because it’s the beginning of winter. Moreover, most of the host families are very protective of their volunteers. I know Sarah’s host mother calls her ‘mi bebe’. Speaking of winter, it gets pretty cold during the night. I sleep in a sleeping bag that’s rated for 30°F and under two heavy blankets. It’s pretty crazy. What’s even crazier is that it still gets to ~90°F during the day. Culture classes are a bit of a joke. They’re interesting and the teacher is wonderful, but we learn so much more by just interacting with our families. One interesting thing here is that you have to greet everyone, everywhere. Even random people you pass on the street need to hear a ‘Buenos dias’ or at the least ‘Hola’. And for the people that you greet you have to touch cheeks and do an air kiss – like they do in the movies. It takes some getting used to but I’m getting there.

This past Saturday we got a tour of the regional Peace Corps office. Of course we had already seen the training center for our placement interviews (language and host family). The training center has latrines, or ‘baños ecologicos’, which is the pc term, I guess. I find it funny that my host family has a better bathroom than the Peace Corps training center. It’s also funny that it took me till yesterday to figure out that ‘Cuerpo de Paz’ means Peace Corps in Spanish. Anyways, the training center, aside from latrines also has several offices and classrooms for the trainees. There is a medical office and that’s where we get our weekly vaccinations. I’ve gotten Hep A, rabies, and the flu vaccine so far. There is also a lounge with one (1) computer. The competition for this one (1) computer gets pretty fierce. The training center also has several gardens and a couple of worm bins. Most people in Bolivia (including the training center) grow most of the foodstuffs that they need. They also raise the animals, and not just on the farms. The regional office looks like an office building you would see in the US. It has four floors and is very plush. It’s also got a book exchange and a shower for volunteers to use. Most of the non-training staff and third year volunteers work from there.

The day before yesterday (May 16th), I went to a fiesta. It was accidental actually since we were just supposed to pick up Sarah’s host mama. It was like an Indian party. You can’t just go in and out in five minutes. We went in and the hostess made us sit and gave us giant plates of food. It looked delicious but unfortunately every single thing on that plate had meat in it. Luckily, Doña Nora (Sarah’s mom) was able to take it all home as leftovers. There was also traditional Bolivian dancing which was very beautiful. Sarah’s mom is a fantastic dancer. She also enjoys it a lot. There’s a dance called the cuenco where the dancers all hold handkerchiefs in their hands and make graceful gestures with them while they dance. It was fun to watch.

One other fun event that happened was a saint parade (on the 15th). It was exactly like the ones we have in India. Some people carry the deity around the streets, stopping at houses for donations. They have a small parade with music and dancers. Here it was the same. The saint was San Isidro labrador (worker, not the type of dog). It was a Catholic saint. I have pictures of that as well which I will try to post.

Well, this post has been extremely long. I will try to avoid such long posts by posting more regularly. I have to go into town to get to an internet café though, so it might be a weekly thing. Hope all is well with everyone else. Look forward to hearing from you!

So after a long and somewhat difficult journey, I´m now in Cochabamba. I wasn´t in Miami for a long time since my flight was very delayed and I missed all the staging events on Monday. Luckily with some help from Peace Corps everything was resolved and my luggage was found. From Miami, we went to La Paz. You hear that La Paz is very high up but you don´t really understand that till you´re standing still in the airport and still panting for breath. It wasn´t too bad though. We were only there long enough to catch our connecting flight to Cochabamba. So, nothing new has happened yet, except arriving in Cochabamba, catching up on rest, and emails. This afternoon we talk about what´s going to happen in the next few days and training starts on Monday so I´ll have more to update then. Hope things are going well with you all!

Yup, I finally caved and started a blog. This is just a better way for me to keep in touch with everyone over the next 2.25 years while I volunteer with Peace Corps in Bolivia. Of course if you still wish to email, or write, or even send me packages, I won't argue. So, I still have a week before I leave and I'm just hanging out with friends and family. I'm still getting things together and doing some last minute shopping. My room is a mess. I leave for Miami on May 7th then Bolivia on May 8th (I think). I'm very excited, and a bit nervous, but not as nervous as I was going to college. Which is weird I think. For college, I only went to St. Louis and I saw my folks about a month later. This trip is a bit farther and I won't see my family till Christmas (I'm still trying to convince my mother to come). Anyways, I'm really excited to meet all my fellow Basic Sanitation volunteers in Miami and start training. I readily admit that the only thing I know about water sanitation is to boil and filter it before drinking, so I have a lot to learn and I'm eager to get started!