I guess I win the worst blogger ever award. I've never been much of a writer. Anywho, everything is pretty much the same here. I thought I would share a bit about life as a PCV. Life here is a series of random occurrences. Last Friday, for example. I had a youth group meeting in the afternoon. We did an activity to encourage diversity. I put a post-it with a symbol on it on the back of every kid. They could not see their own but they see those of everyone else. Then I simple said organize yourselves. Of course they put themselves in groups by symbols. Triangles here, circles there. But a few kids had random symbols that didn't fit anywhere so they were left out. Then I pointed out that I did not say how they should organize themselves and there was no reason for them to exclude anyone. Next, we talked about what we should do for Mother's Day. We're going to put on a short program with dances and songs by some of the kids. To be figured out better, later. Lastly we did an English activity. I gave each person an activity in Spanish to perform, running, dancing, jumping, etc. Of the other kids, the first to name the action in English would get a point on our point board. Which completely started as bribery, a way to keep them interested and showing up. Now I realized today it can be both incentive and remonstrance. Sometimes they like to try to get a rise out of me by using bad words in English. Every time they do it now it is a lost point. I have so much respect for teachers. Those were all of my planned activities for the day but that was not sufficient (according to them). So we played the local version of London Bridge which ends with tug-of-war. Then duck, duck, goose. I often feel twenty-four going on ten here. Then they tried to trap me in the Health Center to try to get me to sing any song by Bon Jovi, Bryan Adams, or Troy Bolton (a character from High School Musical, this was coming from the nine year old and I managed not to say I'd rather kill myself) in English. I managed to escape but not before treating (or punishing) them with a few choruses of We Are the World. It's hard to resist that much begging. Do I have an explanation for this? Not really.

Another thing I cannot explain coherently to all of you. We recently crossed international borders for Wendy's. Yes, the restaurant with the pig-tailed girl. We were all dying for a Frostie. It was during Holy Week, Semana Santa, when very little work gets done all throughout Central America. Most people go to the beaches and we heard they are miserably crowded so we decided to go to Tegulcigalpa, capital of Honduras and get Wendy's. Our own little Harold and Kumarian adventure. Managua has many food chains but it is lacking both Wendy's and Chilis so we conquered both. Life is definitely the little things.

I wanted to say a big thank you to United Methodist Church in Dayton. A collection was taken at Easter for a project in La Mora and your generosity is overwhelming. The sports equipment that was collected at Christmas is being put to good use. I keep all of the items in my room and they knock on my window whenever they want something and then return it by nighttime. The ideas for the donated money at this time are a library/youth center and school gardens to improve nutrition. I'll do my best to keep you updated on our progress.

And I'm back. I was in the States for the holidays, twelve days, maybe twelve and a half since I had to stay a night in Chicago on the way back but I made it just fine. It was nice to touch down and immediately ditch the sweater I had. I spent New Year's at the Laguna de Apoyo with other volunteers and it was beautiful. The Laguna is the best swimming hole in the country and was once a volcano that sunk a very long time ago and became a lake. We stayed in small actual villas which was very cool. I also toured quickly the colonial city of Granada on my way back up, a popular tourist destination. Beautiful architecture and good food but it definitely did not feel like being in Nicaragua so I was glad to get back to site.

La Mora was exactly where I left it, everything is pretty much the same here. Unfortunately too many days spent speaking English had a detrimental effect on my Spanish but I have been getting back into it, even starting some novels in Spanish for practice. I went to a birthday party the day after I got back and found out what I had thought was very odd Kool-Aid was corn liquor- guaro. Oops. I handed the rest of mine off after I found that out. I would prefer not to accidentally get drunk in front of people I want to respect me.

I started the youth group meetings back up. I also started a small competition, practically bribery. At every meeting there will opportunities to gain points and at the end of the month the person with the most points will win a prize. We had two small races. I gave them Post-its with body parts written on them in English and they had to put them on their partner in the correct places. We had a good laugh especially when the wind came up and they struggled to keep them on. The second was a relay race of crab, bear, rabbit and seal walking/ jumping. To finish they had to answer a question correctly about Nicaragua. But the best part came when I unveiled some of the donated items I brought back from the States (thanks to my family and the Methodist church). Many of the items are still in the PC office in the city of Esteli because with the forty minute walk from the bus stop I simply couldn't carry them but I did bring two Frisbees and three baseballs back. Soon I was ducking to avoid being hit in the head with those same baseballs and Frisbees. On Saturday, we went down to an open pasture and I taught them the game Ultimate Frisbee or as I called it in Spanish “platillo al maximo”. I am pretty sure they liked it because they have played it every day since, usually just in the road with four people.

I also found some recipes for chocolate cake and banana bread that I will be trying out this week with some of the women in the community. They recently built ovens with the help of a cooperative but people in the community still buy a lot of the bread that is brought in from other cities. I also just filled out an application for tree seeds with an online non- profit Trees for the Future. February is best month to plant trees, starting them out in small bags and then planting them in the ground at the beginning of the wet season in May. That's all for now, take care.

Well I am clearly not the most diligent blogger, but haven't had too much to report. I have been in my site since August 3rd. I have been trying to adjust and meet people within the community which is a slower process than it should be, hampered by my at times faulty Spanish. It is getting easier including the Spanish. My host family is wonderful. My host mom is a local health volunteer and she performs a lot of first aid within the community. My host dad is a farmer who also sits on many of the local agriculture committees. There are three kids, a nineteen year old university agriculture major, a thirteen year old boy, and a ten year old girl. The community is very small and most of the members are somehow related so I have many other host family relatives to keep me company. The community is only about 100 people and we are bordered on both sides by communities of 400 people. During my service I hope to work in all three communities.

As an agriculture volunteer, one of my goals is to work to improve food security. I have started a few things with that in mind. I began a youth group at the beginning of September. We decided to have two meetings a week and we will have four different themes, if you will, gardening, English, sports and cooking. We planted a garden and made a compost pile. The compost pile was especially fun. We formed two teams and each team was responsible for gathering one of the two main ingredients which are cattle manure and dry leaves. The kids were racing up and down the road with sacos (Spanish- all purpose sacks) and shovels. One group played it smart and grabbed a wheel barrow (that was not my group). The garden was enclosed to protect it from the chickens that think the whole world exists for them to eat and crap all over. We planted carrots, cucumber, tomato, and peppers. The peppers and tomatoes were planted in a small seed nursery for later transplant and really flourished. The carrots and cucumbers, not so much. The ants had a feast and ate all of the seeds. My host brother retaliated by killing them off with pesticide. I had hoped to use more organic methods but I decided to let them handle it for now and next time around (when there is more water and things are easier) to try something different. But even if I didn’t particularly like the methods the garden is looking great right now. All the peppers and tomato plants have been transplanted and the plants are very healthy. Angel, my host brother, even dug another row and plans to plant potatoes this weekend. The compost is done and we’ll be spreading that in the next couple of days.

Another thing I did with the youth group was a tool Peace Corps suggests for trying to get to know your community. I divided the group into guys and girls and asked them to draw the community as they saw it. They also put notations of places they frequently used and places that they do or do not like. The last question was what is missing in the community that they would like to have. The answers to all of these helped provide me with some ideas for my service. The three ideas they had for what could be added to the community were a library, a sports field, and reforestation. I also hope to explore the possibility of making the youth group into a 4-H group as that is something that would give it some structure and I have personal experience as a former member.

I had my first community meeting with the women. Well, actually it was a second attempt at a first meeting. The first was thwarted by rain; no one goes anywhere when it rains. Wish we could use that excuse in the States. I introduced myself and asked what ideas they had for improving the community food security. They like the idea of a cooking group. Which is great except that I am a lousy cook. The most difficult thing I made in the States was Hamburger Helper. However, my host mom and I have been testing some recipes when we have the time and ingredients so we will probably start there. We made peanut butter yesterday and it tasted pretty good. The first time we burned the peanuts and the result was awful. We have also experimented with soy products, and breakfast foods. Felicita, my host mom, especially loves pancakes. For the first women’s group meeting we are going to try to make jams, one thing with which I actually do have experience. We found a papaya that a neighbor had. As I am going into town for my mail (and to post this on the net) I am going to look for some dragonfruit or pineapple.

Outside of the goings on in my site, I just had my three month week long Spanish training session. Those of us who came in with lower level Spanish met with Peace Corps language facilitators once more to pick up where we left off three months ago when training completed. It was a great opportunity to learn some of the more complicated verb tenses that we didn’t have a chance to explore with teachers before. But 32 hours of language in four days was a lot and by the end my head felt a little full. The annual Peace Corps cocktail party hosted by the small business sector happened to be last Friday, the same day our classes finished and since we near Managua we all decided to attend. It was fun to get dressed up and stay in a hotel for a night (hot showers!). Our all volunteer conference is coming up in the days before Thanksgiving so we will actually have that opportunity again soon. I am going to be busy for the next six weeks. I am trying to move into my own house and the only available one has trees growing in it, so quite a bit of work there. I will be talking to the school teachers this week about possible future projects plus the women’s and youth meetings. Also I might be planning a trip back to Iowa for the holidays, so lots to do!

I finally created a blog! I will try to post updates from my life here in Nicaragua with the Peace Corps. For specific questions you can e-mail me at kyndra04@gmail.com. It's been three months since I left the U.S. here's a quick recap:

I arrived in Managua, Nicaragua on May 13 with 35 others, 17 of us in the sector of agriculture and 19 in small business. After three days of orientation I went to live with my host family in the department (like counties or states) of Masaya. Training for Peace Corps lasts three months and consists of language, culture, health & safety and technical training. Each week I spent 18-30 hours in Spanish class and attended presentations or charlas over the other topics. Outside of class each training town (4 trainees grouped based upon language ability) needed to form a youth group, give several charlas in Spanish, and maintain a garden and tree nursery. With our youth group we had to commercialize a product and present the results in an agricultural fair during the tenth week of training. Our group made an all natural soda or gaseosa, as they are referred to here, from ginger, cane, pineapple and lemon juice, lemon grass, and sugar. The members of our group named the product Ganaca for a gaseosa natural de Campos Azules, the name of our community. In the competition we received third place out of ten. We were all very proud of the effort and work that our kids put into the product and it was a fun experience.

During training I had to adjust to a new way of life. New food, new language and new customs. Food- mostly rice and beans. But my host mom was an excellent cook and my only problem was actually being overfed. The Spanish is still a battle. It has definitely improved but I'm still struggling at times which can be frustrating. I also have a new found tolerance for creepy crawlies. I killed my very own hand sized spider which before would have paralyzed me. Haven't developed such tolerance that I'll actually allow anything I see to live though. I battled through a bout of food poisoning and kicked a mouse out of my bed. I even skinned and gutted a rabbit. All in all it was an interesting three months.

On July 31st, Nica 50 (our "class") swore in as official Peace Corps volunteers in Managua. We were in Manauga for a few days prior as well, during which we enjoyed a few creature comforts we had been lacking such as hot showers, wireless, and the use of a pool. A few of us even went to the movies to see the new Harry Potter (in English!). It was a nice break from the campo, but after a few days I was excited to go to my site. I arrived at my site in the department of Jinotega last week. For the first three months we are encouraged to simply try to meet people in the community, try to improve our language if we need to, and adjust to our new lives as PCVs. My site is in a valley of a beautiful green mountain range. It's located in cattle country so obviously there are plenty of cows and horses. The main crops are corn and beans but we are close to coffee country which means that I now receive real coffee instead of instant. That's all for now, if you have questions don't hesitate to ask!