I left St. Louis on August 22nd and since then it's been 8 weeks of training to prepare us for the next two years of service as volunteers. The training gave me lots of great tools and I thought the 5 trainers were top notch. But what really made the long days a good time was sharing them with the 8 other new volunteers, all of us in it together.

Last Thursday we had our swearing in ceremony to officially become volunteers after passing training. The regional director came in to administer the oath and a representative of the government gave a speech welcoming us and setting high standards for our service.

A bunch of the Taiwanese volunteers on the island came as well as some of our homestay families, school principles and teachers, and our trainers, all to cheer us on. Afterwards we all celebrated with the current PC volunteers, there's 20 of us on the island now.

The way my life has been going, the two years ahead of me may just fly by. Already there are big things to look forward to during my time here.

Tomorrow is the 30th Anniversary of SVG's independence from Great Britain. People all over the island are wearing the national colors-Green, Yellow, and Blue and there are celebrations and events taking place to commemorate the anniversary.

Nov 25th- When SVG did gain its independence, it was given a constitution from Britain to set up its first government. Over the past several years, politicians have been working on creating a new constitution, one not given to them by a colonizer, but their very own. The newly proposed constitution is being debated vigorously and is up for a vote on Nov. 25th. It will need just over 66% approval to be passed.

Sometime Next Year- At least every five years the Prime Minister must call parliamentary elections and this must happen before the end of 2010, so after the vote on the constitution, I imagine, the gears will start turning on the national elections. The two major parties here are the ULP-United Labor Party who are currently in control of the government and the opposition, the NDP-New Democratic Party. There is a Green Party but I'm not sure how influential they are.

Next Year- The 2010 World Cup will be taking place in South Africa next summer and anyone living outside of the U.S. knows that the bars will be full of people pulling for their favorite teams. Soccer is very popular here, as well as cricket, I'm looking forward to watching matches with locals.

2011-The Peace Corps will be celebrating its 50th Anniversary. I'm not sure all what will be taking place but I have some high expectations. St. Lucia was one of the first few countries the Peace Corps came to and I believe they have had volunteers coming continuously since '61, so the presence here in the Eastern Caribbean is very deep.

I feel fortunate to be here at this time and the opportunity to share it with Vincentians and other PC volunteers. Will be a great time to create some fantastic memories.

Sorry I haven't had any time to post over the last few weeks. Only 7 days until I move into my house and hopefully soon after internet will be hooked up. This is a great video a former volunteer made just before finishing service and heading home a few weeks ago. I think it's fantastic!

If the player isn't working through this blog, here is the direct site for it http://www.vimeo.com/6608069

I Love You SVG from Katie Sheridan on Vimeo.

My first week on SVG is over and just wanted to give a quick update while no one is waiting to use the computer in the Peace Corps office. Our first few days of training went well, although they may have dragged on a bit for some of us. We have three trainers from the island who will be working with us on Culture, Youth Development, and Community Development. All of them have years of experience under their belts, are good presenters, and will be great resources and mentors for us over the next two years.

Training days are a little long, but afterwards we've been doing some exploring of the capital , Kingstown. I always have to be mindful of the time. My town, Chateaubelair, is just over an hour away and the vans stop running out there by 6pm. One day I got to the bus station just after 5;30, a van for Chateau pulled up about 10 mintutes later and there was a mad rush for seats, luckyily I made it on. This weekend I hung out with the family a little bit. I brought down a book on making paper airplanes, and the family's son Yanick, his cousin Winston, and I spent the afternoon trying out about 5 different models. The planes are fairly intricate to fold, but man some of them flew over 50 yards. Sunday morning I joined the family at Church. In the pre-arrival Peace Corps handbook on the Eastern Caribbean, they stress how important khakis are, and I wore a pair to church, but I stuck out a bit as almost all the men were looking sharp in black dress pants and white oxford shirts. So I just picked up a new pair of pants which are being hemmed and already have the shirt, so I'll be ready this Sunday. Ok, gotta get back from lunch break for the rest of training. Peace.

It’s Saturday and we’re into day 5 of training here on St. Lucia. This morning we had a mental health specialist up to talk with us about the challenges we’ll be facing over the next two years. We brainstormed all of the challenges that may come up that could make us feel down while we’re volunteers. And then she stressed that mental health is not about being positive all of the time, that it’s perfectly normal to be down, but that it’s the way we cope that allows one to stay healthy. So next, we talked about ways to cope with all of the challenges we had identified earlier.

The afternoon is here and we’ve been given it off to relax and hang out. So I thought I’d use it to write my first post from the islands. So far everything is going well. There are 21 new volunteers in the group. 9 including myself will be going to St. Vincent, 10 are headed for St. Kitts, and 2 will be on St. Nevis. We have a great variety in our group, people from all over the U.S. with experience ranging from recent college graduates all the way up to a volunteer in her late seventies, with the rest spread out in between. There are two married couples and out of the 21, 6 are male.

For the week, we’re staying at a retreat center on a hillside just outside of St. Lucia’s capital, Castries. The center is run by a group of Benedictine nuns who have been very welcoming and prepare amazing meals for us.

Through the five days of training so far we’ve been giving some great and useful information. I found out I’ll be living in the town of Chateaubelair which is on the western coast of St. Vincent about 2/3 up the coast. There is already a PC volunteer who’s been there for one year and I found a blog she writes and checked it out to get an idea about the place. Reading it got me excited about the move there. I also found out that Peace Corps has been in the area for 48 years and that I’ll be here for the 50th anniversary in 2011, so I’m sure there will be some huge festivities to celebrate when the time rolls around.

That’s all for now. Monday morning, I repack my things and head out on a short flight to St. Vincent where I’ll have 7 more weeks of training while living with a host family. I’ll be sure to write more.

The photos above are from around the retreat center and the others I took while we were in the capital yesterday doing a scavenger hunt.

Well, I'm not officially done with graduate school, but have finished up all my course work. The Peace Corps will count as 6 credit hours, and then I have to write a final paper before I can pick up the degree.

When I do finish, I doubt I'll make it back to Normal for a graduation ceremony. Thinking of that reminded me of a commencement speech by David Foster Wallace that I enjoy reading every once in a while. Here are some parts of it:

Twenty years after my own graduation, I have come gradually to understand that the liberal arts cliché about teaching you how to think is actually shorthand for a much deeper, more serious idea: learning how to think really means learning how to exercise some control over how and what you think. It means being conscious and aware enough to choose what you pay attention to and to choose how you construct meaning from experience. ...

And I submit that this is what the real, no bullshit value of your liberal arts education is supposed to be about: how to keep from going through your comfortable, prosperous, respectable adult life dead, unconscious, a slave to your head and to your natural default setting of being uniquely, completely, imperially alone day in and day out....

And the so-called real world will not discourage you from operating on your default settings, because the so-called real world of men and money and power hums merrily along in a pool of fear and anger and frustration and craving and worship of self. Our own present culture has harnessed these forces in ways that have yielded extraordinary wealth and comfort and personal freedom. The freedom all to be lords of our tiny skull-sized kingdoms, alone at the center of all creation. This kind of freedom has much to recommend it. But of course there are all different kinds of freedom, and the kind that is most precious you will not hear much talk about much in the great outside world of wanting and achieving and [unintelligible -- sounds like "displayal"]. The really important kind of freedom involves attention and awareness and discipline, and being able truly to care about other people and to sacrifice for them over and over in myriad petty, unsexy ways every day....

The entire speech is here. Starts off a little slow but gets better.

I wrote this in January 2008, just before going back to school. I don't know why I never posted it.

Do you ever hear people say “Live each day like it was your last?” Well, what would you do if it was your last day on earth? Think about it.

I’d probably rent out a park pavilion or one of my favorite restaurants, fly in as many of my friends as possible, gather them all together with my family, and then have a damn good time over food and drinks, just talking about all the times we’ve shared together. And then call it a life.

I don’t think Live everyday like it’s your last, is a good saying. Because I couldn’t nor wouldn’t want to repeat the above day over and over. I think a better question is “If you knew you were going to die tomorrow, would you be happy with your life?”

Answer that one.

Now the truth is, most likely we’re not going to die tomorrow or for some time. So if the answer is No, stop and think, what would you change in your life, what action would you take so that you could answer Yes, if I died tomorrow I would be happy with how I lived.

Start dreaming and make it your own.

Your life is 100% your own responsibility. This can be both completely liberating and completely terrifying. But I will tell you this, the more you start living your dreams, the less terrifying it is to take the first step of each dream. What is holding you back, what piece of security are you holding on to? Security is an illusion- loved ones die, money disappears, marriages end in divorce, the only certainty in life is change. It’s scary.

Do you know what it feels like to have a dream, and actually know you’ll fulfill it? And what happens is with success comes more success. In the last year I’ve written some dreams down, and I have every intention of making them a reality.

So what to do, dreams just don’t happen. Set yourself up for success. First write it down, then tell your friends about it. But pick friends who are going to support and encourage you, not ones who will bring you down. Next start preparing to make it happen. Investigate, talk to people who are doing what you want to do, read about people who have made it happen. Find out about the steps they took and the mistakes they made. Start creating a plan, but be aware the plan will change, plan for small steps and be realistic.

Now it’s time to cut away the fat. What resources is it going to take to achieve your goal? Probably a good deal of money and time. Lifestyle changes have to be made. Three happy hours a week get cut down to one or none, dinners out turn into cooking at home, get rid of the car and take the bus, subway, or carpool. Look at life hour by hour and see what changes you can make, best to implement them one at a time.

Ok, the fat is trimmed, and tough times are on. The conveniences of life have been stripped away, and you realize it will take a year to save up the money you’ll need to start out. So life is harder and it’s going to be like this for some time. What I do now is start devouring books, not just anything though. Read about people breaking away from what they were expected to do with their lives and venturing out on their own, to live their dreams, and find out what really makes them happy, not what they’re told by society will make them happy. These readings will strengthen your mind and its resolve. At the same time, why not strengthen the body, work-out, run, play basketball. If you feel strong in body and mind, you won’t miss your old routines, in fact you’ll begin to see them as the distractions they are/were to you living your dreams.

I love babies, and they’re damn cute all over the world, especially Chinese babies. Walking around the streets of Beijing, I soon began to notice that a lot of babies were inadvertently flashing and mooning me. They were wearing open crotch (and butt) pants with no diapers.

A few more days in and I saw a mom holding her baby over a public trashcan as the kid peed into it. The next day in the Forbidden City, a mother and son were next to a street gutter. The mom started clicking her tongue, the baby son, who could barely walk, squatted perfectly over the gutter and with a look of extreme concentration tried let one drop. The mom was clicking a little too early, the son in turns out didn’t have to go.

Sarah and I had already discussed the logistics of the Chinese baby pants. The conclusion was excremental chaos, babies would surely piss and poop all over their cribs, houses, and any relative holding them, disaster! Now I had seen that there was some sort of special communication between mother and child that could queue the child to go. And it seems as the baby grows a little older they learn to take care of it themselves.

With a look of intense concentration on his face, 21-month-old Zhang Xueyang explores the playground, ducking under swings and slides as fast as his legs can carry him. Suddenly, he stops in mid-stride and squats, the seam of his pants parting smoothly to allow him to urinate on the concrete.

Zhang is able to pee thanks to kaidangku. Such pants have been popular in China for decades.

The principle is clear: no-fuss waste disposal. They're split down the middle-in front and back-and provide what many parents say is maximum convenience with minimum coverage.

When searching for these pants online, I came across a term on a mothering site called EC-ing, further snooping around found it stood for Elimination Communication! Apparently there is a movement in natural mothering to develop this communication technique which apparently leads to a child becoming toilet trained much quicker. Here are the articles:

http://www.naturalbirthandbabycare.com/elimination-communication.html

http://www.naturalbirthandbabycare.com/ec.html

In a way I feel bad for the Chinese babies. I told Sarah that the previous summer I had spent nearly a month backpacking through Wyoming. I had soon become appreciative of nature’s call in the wild. Nothing like dropping trough and feeling a lovely breeze on your bottom. So when these kids graduate from the crotchless pants, surely having come to expect a bottom breeze, underwear must be a complete turn-off – stifling, uncomfortable, itchy, and just cumbersome. I’m sure many tears are shed when this dreaded day comes.

Unfortunately, the days of crotchless pants might be numbered according to this article in the China Daily http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/english/doc/2004-07/16/content_349150.htm. If I were you, I’d immediately buy stock in China Pampers and Huggies.

“What ya doing just sitting around?”

“Passing time, man, passin time.”

In the workforce there are full-timers, part-timers, and the unemployed, in China there seemed to be another grouping, the passing-timers. Mao once said, “Women hold up half the sky.” Well, it seemed like in many places in China they’re holding up much more.

When we would venture off the tourist path into more rural areas, time and again Sarah and I would see groups of men who looked like their posteriors had become one with their seats, as if it had been ages since a work day had been had. I call these guys the passing-timers. They whittle away the daylight hours in groups of two to ten, playing cards or chess, rolling dice, smoking, shooting the shit, or just staring off into space. On hot days they find shade and go topless. Meanwhile, you peak into their families’ front doors or at their plots of lands and you see the women of the house working hard, running a business out of the front room, taking care of the family, tending crops, basically getting things done.

Apparently, the men sit around while the women make the world go around. I recently finished reading a book about a Peace Corps worker in Togo, Africa. He described the men of his village in nearly the same way. But when harvesting season came, these guys were out before sun-up and back after dark, working the fields. I don’t know if it’s the same in China, one can only hope that they try to hold up their half of the sky. Forget about retirement, these guys are lifelong, professional p-timers.

I've been home from my trip just over four months now. In January I'm headed 3 hours away over into Illinois to begin a grad school program in Politics and Government. My time home has been outstanding though it has gone by so fast. Leaving Asia, my plan was to come home and spend some quality time with the family. We've had some great times together but as usual, it never seems like enough, and that I could've put more effort into it. A lot of highlights for the autumn. We won our volleyball league and celebrated the night away with the $100 bar tab prize, spent an outrageous night at a halloween costume party with my sisters, best-friend Tommy, and friends, had a humongous Thanksgiving dinner with everyone minus a Turkey, a first for the Fischer family, last Sunday I spent the afternoon with Mom hanging her artwork, a realtor basically turned her large office into an art gallery and Mom and I spent the time hanging many of her pieces, just reminded me how creative she is. But besides all the special events and happenings, I just really enjoyed hanging out and talking with these people that mean the most to me. Some new family photos are up at my Shutterfly page, some from volleyball, Dad's birthday, and Halloween pics of Grace and Henry.

Three of the last four Kiva loans have just been fully repaid. And the fourth one, Ms.Ropati, the farmer in Samoa is paying back right on time. Her loan term is just longer than the others at sixteen months. When I got into Kiva, I saw the power behind their idea, but something that didn't even occur to me is the rolling over of funds. Over 99% of the borrowers fully repay their loans, and what is happening is the lenders, people like you and me, instead of cashing out, reloan to new borrowers. One year ago, people had funded $2 million worth of businesses, now that figure has passed $16 million, and a big part of that has been people reloaning their money out.

Two months ago, the extremely well-run micro-finance institute, Patan Business and Professional Women in Nepal, posted their first borrower. I had the great fortune to visit them and see how their organization operates. In those two months they have funded 68 businesses. I have been trying to become a lender for one of their loans, but each one is fully funded in 2 hours on average. So I have got to be quick to become part of one. Hopefully it will happen soon.

In the meantime, I decided on 3 new businesses. There is Jacqueline Muthoni, a tailor in Kenya, Maruja García Pinedo who runs her own small grocery store in Peru, and Angel Riveros, a welder in Paraguay. All look like great businesses to me and I would love to have the fortune to visit them someday at their shops. Another feature I like about kiva is that lenders can create their own lender page where I can view all loans made and see how I'm distributing them between different countries, sectors, and gender. Here's the page to get an idea of what I'm talking about. Another great feature are kiva certificates to give as gifts, fantastic idea for the upcoming holidays.

There is a Flow that exists in life and traveling. It’s not fate or destiny, but when you tap into it, events seem to happen for a reason and at just the right time. The world opens up to you and presents you with all the beauty and energy it has to offer. One of the reasons I travel is to access this current. There are certain things in life that keep me from reaching into it. The main one being habit and routine, any type of shutting down or going on ‘auto pilot’, also close-mindedness, a judgmental attitude, or any belief that I already know everything there is to know about my surroundings. For me, putting myself into a completely new setting allows me to shed all of these obstacles. It brings me to a place where my mind opens up, discovery and curiosity take over, my senses completely awaken, and the world is there to dive into. This flow also requires a letting go, putting a trust into the goodness of the world and the people in it. Allowing it to bring you to the places you need to be, meet the people you are supposed to meet, and do the things you should be doing.

So days occur on the road which are like no others, where around every corner the world is ready to show you how fascinating it is, when you are lost and a person comes at just the right time to help you in the right direction, where everything falls into perfect place and everything seems right in the world just as it should be. Early in my China travels, Sarah and I tapped into this Flow and had one of these days that I live for.

After a few quick days in Beijing, we jetted down to Guilin, and then hopped on a bus for the town of Yangshou in south-central China. We were here to see the amazing karst (limestone) mountains of the region. I have found that most of the breathtaking scenery I’ve encountered across my travels can be found also somewhere back home in the US. But as far as I know, we don’t have these karst mountains, which create a mystical surrounding that I have fallen in love with. In a land of flat rice fields, the landscape is filled with mountains that suddenly jut out of the ground like knifeblades. Tall and steep, they create a landscape that should be inhabited by giants. Instead there are roads, paths, and rivers that make their way through the land twisting and turning around the mountains.

Sarah and I wanted to dive in and get as close as we could to the local scene in the area. We woke up early when the tourist town of Yangshou was still sleeping, grabbed a quick breakfast, rented a pair of bikes and headed out leaving swirls of sunscreen odor in the air as we rode through town. In no time we moved from city streets to gravel roads to dirt paths, to no path to a dead end, on the way taking in all there was to see, locals biking to work, flower girls selling fresh natural tiaras, dogs feeding their young, and all sorts of farm animals milling about. At the dead end we decided to cross the rice fields on their foot wide elevated paths, only to end up at another dead end into a toothless farmer’s home and yard. With a wide smile and broad straw hat he motioned us to cross over his ancient stone fence and make our way through his land back to a path. Backtracking to the road, many more bicyclist were now out and about including some Chinese couples out on tandem bikes for two, some wearing newly bought flower tiaras.

At some point here we pick up a follower, a local woman who attempts to communicate with us, but it just wasn’t happening. We felt fine on our own but she continued to ride along side with us with a smile and a rather pleasant air about her. But a few miles further down another local woman starts biking with us and we are being followed at this point by two Chinese women on bikes—potential tour guides—vying for our business, even though we have not asked for and do not want a tour. At one point, these women have a shouting match (no exaggeration) over, we're pretty sure, which one of them is going to be our paid local guide.As we bike onward, it appears this competition will be won by the person who follows us farther. So for a few hours we are three; when we stop to photograph the sleeping boy, the remaining woman looks on with a smile. When we sip our water, she sips hers. When we get back on the bikes, so does she. No words are exchanged, but there is no air of ill feelings between us either.

We come to a bridge spanning a small river and after a few pictures cross over to a tiny town. All the locals seem to be hanging out at the general store, giving the rest of the town an abandoned feeling, ours for the exploring. Crumbling houses, stables with cows and oxen, and yards dotted with personal belongings draw us in where we come upon a chicken and then a gaggle of young ducks making their way home on a rice paddy path back from a swim in the river. Heading out of town we stop for a coke and a few minutes of lounging around which the local men here are so good at doing that it seems like they’ve made a job out of it.

We leave this town for another our guidebook mentions, an ancient one dating back to the Tang, Ming, and Qing dynasties. We’re not sure where it is, but we take one turn off the main road, and we’ve struck gold. Walking into the small town we pass three man-made pools, one of which has a massive water buffalo in it bathing under the hot mid-day sun. Around the corner we come upon two massive sows, so heavy they try but can’t get up to welcome us. We head down the street with houses on each side. This town too seems abandoned but here and there we peak into open doors and see families cooling off at the lunch table or in front of their TV sets.

A few more streets down we come upon a young boy being given a haircut right in the middle of the street. We capture with a few snaps of Sarah’s camera and pass by admiring the barber’s work. Next we come upon a man taking a nap on the threshold to his yard. We walk slowly down the street but he awakens and is all smiles as his beautiful set of gleaming white dentures punctuates his face. He invites us in where his yard is filled with beautiful wood work, he is proud and happy to show off the masterpiece as well as his potted plants. We share smiles, pics, and a few handfuls of peanuts. A donation is asked for, no problem this time, as we were happy to help out this jolly man.

Back on the road, were not sure which way to head. We’ve been told there is a beautiful riverfront spot with a few places to eat and some great lounging. We start biking, but we’re running low on water, the temperature is in the high 90s and the humidity is so high we’ve sweated out all the water we have drunk. We’re in the shade of a single tree on a path in the middle of fields. The local highway is in front of us and tempts us to call it a day and just head back to our air-conditioned hotel room. A few minutes pass, I’m not sure what to do. Then I see a young girl biking her way towards us. We break out the lonely planet looking up the language section, ready to ask for directions. The biker pulls over at our motions and we soon find out she speaks fairly good English. What luck, her English name is Joey, she’s a high school senior and here in the middle of nowhere her favorite class is English. She begins to give us directions but then just decides to bring us there herself. After another 30 minutes of biking we make it to the river and a restaurant, ready for a good lunch which included the best fried rice either of us have ever had. We get to know Joey and she is just the coolest person we’ve met so far, answering all of our questions we come to know what it’s like to be a student here. After a few beers, some river gazing, and much needed lounging about, we take a look around town and then head on out. Joey accompanies us back to the highway home and then leaves us with a big smile on her face. Our ride home is smooth and easy going, and just as a rain storm opens up on us, we reach a toll gate with plenty of coverage. Then back into the populated area we have a fun time swerving, dodging, and mastering the art of bike riding in Chinese traffic, it’s a fun way to get the pulse moving.

That evening another sumptuous dinner is had and the day is proclaimed an enormous success. These are the days I live for on the road. Not days in museums, or temples, or spent hanging out with other backpackers. But days interacting with people that are the heart of this country, taking pleasure in seeing what their lives are like, and knowing that life is good. And I’ve gotta say that Jeremy was right, it was incomparably better sharing the experience with someone who means so much to me.

Months have passed in a bit of silence on the blog, which doesn’t mean nothing was going on rather everything and anything was taking place. Basically my travels went supernova, the action and adventure ramped up to a rocket popping crescendo to finish off my time abroad. Just thinking of it all at this moment as I pound the keys at home puts a massive grin on my face as all of the memories flood through my mind.

In mid-June it all began with a flight over the Himalayas, gaping at the sight of Mt.Everest on my left side, landing in the capital of Tibet, Lhasa, and then onward to Beijing and my first of many ice-cold Tsingtao beers to beat the heat.

Months earlier over email I had caught up with a great college friend and past travel companion from my days in Italy. Sarah was going to be out of the classroom come June and after nailing out the where and when we were set to meet up in China for my final month of travel. This was going to be a bit of a change for me. In the previous 9 months of traveling I hadn’t once buddied up to a fellow backpacker to hit the road together. Sure I had spent lots of time meeting people and hanging out, Fabiola and Blair in Vietnam, Christian, Marta, and Neils in Laos, the great Japanese habitat crew in Thailand, and many other fine people, but when I felt it was time to jet to the next destination, I departed in solitude. I was a little nervous about the next month, questions arose in my mind- had I gotten too used to solitary road life? had my social skills atrophied to mush? could I once again speak English at a normal cadence? I did receive some great words of encouragement from my friend Jeremy, who told me for him traveling with someone he knows well was incomparably better than solo. And then I started thinking back to all of the wonderful places I’ve had the fortune to visit in my life. Whenever I was at a place of inconceivable beauty or wonder a big part of me would be thinking, “I wish this or that person was here, because he/she would just love this.” And a lot of times one of those friends I was wishing was there to experience the same thing with me, was Sarah.

Come June 21st, hotel room keys in hand, flight itinerary for our next destination printed out, and bus ticket to the airport bought, I boarded the shuttle to pick up Sarah and begin the final month of this amazing trip together. I’ll stop there for now, I hope to post entries of our adventures over the next few days and weeks. Talk to you all soon.

This was my last week in Nepal and I was able to meet some fantastic people and get some great work done for Kiva. Kiva just signed up its first field partner in Nepal, BPW (Business and Professional Women) of Patan, a town just outside of Kathmandu. The group has 33 members who are influential and highly-skilled women, bankers, professors, entrepreneurs. They have been running a hugely successful Microcredit program for the last 5 years, so successful that they have a 100% repayment rate. Demand for the small loans has been growing and they have partnered with Kiva to bring in funds.

After my initial office meeting, we headed into the country side to attend a center meeting. The center is where all the action takes place. After an area is surveyed for poverty levels, word is put out BPW micro loans will be available. First all those interested attend a week-long intensive training course, covering loan terms, structure, group dynamics and more. One day is spent teaching the borrowers how to sign their names as this is necessary to accept a loan, but most do not know how to beforehand.

After the training, potential borrowers must group up in 5's and a minimum of 10 are needed, max of 40 or 8 groups, to form a center. After creating individual plans for a small business, a member requests a loan, first loans are $150 and subsequent loans can increase by $60, with a loan term of 12 months. Then all of the center members vote to accept or reject the plan. The reason being is that all members guarantee each loan, so if a person defaults the other members must repay the loan. As all center members live in the same area, this type of peer pressure insure smart decisions on borrowers side.

During the center meeting I attended, the event started of with some group solidarity and self-improvement songs. After that the loan officers collected the monthly repayment from each borrower. Finally, a new borrower requested her first loan, and the other 39 members voted, with a majority agreeing. This loan was for a Mrs.Beana, and after the meeting we walked 10 minutes to visit her home.

Mrs.Beana has an unemployed husband and two daughters in middle school. Her mother-in-law also lives with them. Mrs.Beana's husband is the youngest son in his family, and it is Nepali tradition that mothers live with their youngest son. Mrs.Beana currently owns two small cows, and every day walks through the neighborhood selling pure, fresh cow milk door to door.

She lives in a neighborhood on the far outskirts of kathmandu. Until recently it was primarily a poor farming village. But now rich nepalis are buying plots of land from the farmers and the area is currently half residential and half farming, but the homes are continuing to go up. As a result Mrs.Beana has a growing demand for her milk, and is planning to use the loan to buy another cow, increase milk production, and add to her family's income.

For me this visit was fantastic, because i was able to witness the ability of microcredit to empower the impoverished.

The rest of the week I spent with BPW staff in meetings and at a computer going over the in's and out's of Kiva and how best to utilize the relationship. I have high hopes for BPW. As soon as they finalize approval from the Nepal central bank to receive funds from abroad, you'll soon see profiles of borrowers on the kiva website.

Here's my pics from the week with BPW-http://www.tedfischer.shutterfly.com/action/pictures?a=67b0de21b3526456650a

My first loan with Kiva was a success! Thach Sarin repaid his loan to build a new house for him and his family over the 13 month term of the loan. The $100 was credited to my Kiva account. It's possible for me to withdraw the money, but there's so many good businesses still out there that need the capital to get started. Most of these borrowers would never be able to receive a bank loan because of a lack of collateral. But with Kiva that doesn't matter.

This round I decided to diversify my $100 into four loans of $25. I lent to Ms.Ropati who has a small farm in Samoa, Ms.Garcia who owns and runs a stationary store in Mexico, Mr.Valenzuala, a blacksmith in Mexico, and Ms.Alechanova who has a clothes kiosk in Ukraine. If you want to know more about these 4 businesses, you can see them on my lender page. But better yet, why not try loaning yourself at Kiva. Pic-Ms.Ropati on her farm in Samoa

Nepal is filled with great hiking. A huge part of the country is inaccessible by road. As a result there is a well-established network of trails criss-crossing the country. When asking the average Nepali whose not from Kathmandu how long it takes them to get to their hometown, it's usually along the lines of 8 hours by bus followed by 4 days hiking.

Long ago backpackers started to explore the trails, most likely using tents and sleeping bags. But soon the locals started setting up cozy guesthouses. So now it's possible to do treks lasting up to three weeks without ever needing a tent or cooking gear. On the 11 day Jomsom trek i did, I would pass a cluster of guesthouses every hour or so and would stop for a meal or the night whenever I pleased. The system that has evolved is so convenient for the hikers. Here's my pics from the trip.

From what i've been told, Henry is growing real fast. My sister, Claire, has been sending me some great pics of my new nephew. This one here is my favorite, Henry with his Grandpa Ted. I'm really looking forward to the day I pull into Claire and Chris's driveway to hold him for the first time. Not so far away now. See you soon Henry.

Hello!

I'm so far behind in posts, sorry about that. Will start with most recent happenings and then work my way backwards when I have the time. My last adventure was a two week stay at the Tibetan Buddhist Kopan Monastery on a hilltop over looking Kathmandu. I signed up for their introductory course on Buddhism. The first part of the course was split between meditation practice and buddhist teachings which were always followed by lively Q&A sessions from us skeptical westerners. There were about 50 of us in all. The last 3 days were spent in silent retreat and meditation. The teaching sessions were split between a Swedish nun whose been practicing since 74, and a Tibetan monk. The nun was good because of similar backgrounds and familiarity of the western lifestyle, and the monk was interesting to see buddhism from someone who grew up in it, offering up two different viewpoints.

The monastery itself was very peaceful and was home to over 200 tibetan monks, young and old. It was great to view some of the rituals, like late night chanting filled with low gutteral movements, and their daily debating rounds on the teachings. The debates are very lively, held in small groups, each monk accentuating his points with slapping their hands point by point.

In all it was a great stay, ate well, met good people, and opened up to a different way of seeing the world. Here's some pics, hope you like them.

I swear, people are operating on so many different calendars here, it would be easy to plan a trip hitting a New Years celebration every other week. This past weekend I arrived in Kathmandu to celebrate the Nepali New Year of 2064. I had just finished a Himalayan trek and was in the town of Pokhara. For the new year, they had set up a fair lakeside with carnival rides, food booths, some games, and a stage for bands. Basically the same type of fair you find in the States. So I made a quick decision and shot down to Kathmandu on an 8 hour bus to find a more unique celebration.

I wasn't dissappointed. Sunday morning I jumped off a local bus in the town of Thimi and just headed in the direction of drums and cymbals. Soon I was caught in a crowd of parade goers. Thimi's celebration is different in that along with the traditional music, chariot floats, and parading, everyone is throwing bright orange powder dust around. Everyone around me was covered in orange. At first no one touched me with the dust, being really respectful that I was a visitor. But I wanted to join the fun and started asking people to douse me in the stuff. Soon after, a few guys befriended me, we shared some beers, and then back into the melee for more dancing and singing. Afterwards I visited their families and we shared some moonshine rice whiskey. It was a damn good day, my camera made it through unscathed by the powder and I got some good pics.

Two days earlier,I had jumped off the same local bus a little further down the line in the town of Bharaktpur. They have a 9 day long new year festival. The day I went, not much was going on. I did see the raising of a ceremonial pole that drew a large crowd. And I saw a huge wooden chariot that at some point in the week is pulled around town followed by a huge tug of war between the two sections of town, the winner holding possession of the chariot for the following year. Supposedly that's on Wednesday, so I may take another trip out there.

Besides the festivities, both of these towns were amazing. They were so medieval looking. If you took all the people out of the town, I swear you'd feel like you were in the middle of a 12th Century European town. Here's the pics.

In India, Hinduism is very much a part of everyday, public life. Part of that are Sadhus. These are Hindi ascetics. They are part shaman, part yogi, part priest, part hermit. They renounce all material possessions, some spread leftover ashes from funeral pyres all over their bodies, and they are fairly well respected in the community.

They also practice self mortification and give up sex. Put these two together and some interesting practices arise. I won't put a photo here, but here's the link to some photos of a pair of Sadhus practicing mortification. One sadhu takes a stick, wraps it around his penis 4 times and then another sadhu climbs on top of the stick. The first man supports all of the weight of the second. When it was all over, his penis was flat as a pancake.

I've visited the dessert before, like the Black Rock Dessert in Nevada for Burning Man, and the mountain dessert of Wyoming last summer. I even visited a single massive sand dune on the beach of Muine in Japan. But I've never been to a vast region of sand dunes.

For that reason, I headed deep into Rajasthan, to the golden city of Jaiselmer, the closest point to the Thar Dessert on the border with Pakistan. I joined 3 Belgians, a Spaniard, and a woman from the Micronesian island of New Caldonia on a 5 day camel safari into the Thar.

By day we rode mainly through scrub dessert, but each afternoon we would reach a dune area to set up camp. Man, we were all like kids. The sand is so fine and soft, much more so than a beach. We ran around, threw the Frisbee, jumped, rolled, and cartwheeled down hills, played capture the flag, and the Indian guides taught us a wrestling game perfect for the sand.

Besides the dunes, the camels turned out to be fascinating animals. We were all riding males. Usually females graze in the countryside raising their calves. It is just the end of the 4 month mating season. Whenever we came upon a group of females grazing, the boys would just go crazy. First they would roar as deep and fiercely as lions. After that they would start foaming at the mouths. Next they would eject this weird pouch organ out of their mouths and inflate it with air. The final step was a bit much for us. Somehow male camels have evolved where they urinate backwards, the urine shooting towards their tales. The males would then urinate and crap while spanking their tales against their butts. This in turn would send the piss and crap flying everywhere, and its strong scent traveling to the females. Luckily during the riding their tales were tied to the side to prevent this. But at night after unsaddling them, sometimes we saw the tale slapping in action. I took a lot of pics of the trip. Hope you enjoy them.

Every March the top 65 university basketball teams in America come together to compete in one huge tournament to determine the best team in the nation. The competition is intense and the games fast-paced, accordingly this time of year is called March Madness.

This year my university's team, the Georgetown Hoyas, have performed outstandingly, winning their regular season conference and the conference tournament on the shoulders of Jeff Green and Roy Hibbert, with coach Thompson making the calls.

This weekend it all comes down to the final four teams left in the tournament. The Hoyas have fought hard and are in a position along with UCLA, Florida, and Ohio State, to claim the national title. Let's hope for two more wins. Here's a recap of their most recent game.

Good news to report! After roughly 9 or so hours of labor (some hours tougher than others), my older sister, Claire, gave birth to a baby boy, Henry Luke, at 4am on March 17th, weighing in at 7 pounds, 6 ounces. As the family runs thick with Irish blood, I am sure there are many members who are excited he was born on St.Patrick's Day.

Way back when in July when Claire and her husband Chris told me they were expecting, the name Henry was soon a frontrunner. It was definitely the name I was pulling for. But I thought for sure over the 8 months that minds would change and other names would come up. I never brought names up, hoping Henry wouldn't get overused in the meantime. Luckily it appears it never did! So I must say I'm very happy with his name. His middlename, Luke, comes from our Grandfather, who at 90 years old is still doing well and I know he can't wait for the moment he has Henry on one lap and Grace on the other. I will get a pic up of Henry as soon as one of my sisters or parents gets around to emailing it to me.

-Cheers!

One of my favorite movies of recent years has been Eternal Sunshine of a Spotless Mind. After a passionate but troubled relationship, Clementine played by Kate Winslet, finds an experimental doctor who can erase all of her memories of her boyfriend, Joel (Jim Carrey). After Joel finds out, he heads for the doc too, wanting an erasure for himself. The rest of the movie is a surreal trip through Joel's mind and his memories of Clementine.

It appears this 2004 movie wasn't far off from the truth. India has a great English language newspaper, The Times of India, where I read this article :

"In a discovery which could have far reaching consequences

in not-distant-future, researchers have been able to wipeout a single specific memory from brains of rats using a drug, leaving all other recollections intact. . ." The article talks about the drug's benifits in treating sufferers of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. I too could see the benifit in that, but just think of all the abuses a drug like this could have. Would it really take much to reach the point where you or I would take it once or twice or more in a lifetime, just for a release from the pain of a memory.At least for me, during the initial suffering of some loss, the prospect of erasing the memory would be welcome. But without the pain of life and making mistakes I would never learn about myself, others, the world, I wouldn't be who I am today. Usually that learning doesn't take place until the pain abates, and I can look more honestly at its cause and then learn something.

In many states of India, Hinduism permeates daily life. In some Hindu majority states, vegetarianism is strictly observed, not even egg is to be found on the menu, and some states forbid alcohol. Midway down the flow of the holy Ganges River, lies one of the most sacred cities for Hindus, Varanasi. Here believers in the thousands wash away their sins bathing in the Ganges. More importantly, people come here to die, as a death at this location on the Ganges is believed to release one from the cycle of birth and death. On a daily basis, hundreds of dead Hindus are burned atop individual towers of wood, on the shores of the river. As my guidebook puts it, this city is where the most intimate rituals of life and death take place in public.

But underneath the ceremony is a river struggling to breathe. Along the same area where sins are washed away, 30 large sewers are continuously spewing their discharge into the river. The results are frightening. The water is septic-no dissolved oxygen exists; the concentration of fecal bacteria is 1.5 million per liter, a safe rate for bathing water is only 500 per liter, a constant battle against water borne diseases ensues.

I didn’t shoot many pics to respect all the ceremonies taking place. The first photo of sunrise is mine, the priest and burning ghat I grabbed off Flickr.