Happy Holidays

I can't believe it's already December and the Solstice / Christmas is just around the corner. Thanksgiving was great. We spent the holiday with our Peace Corps family. And it really does feel like a giant, dysfunctional, amazing family. We spent Thanksgiving Day making desserts. I made what I lovingly refer to as banana lump, which was supposed to be banana cream pie but was very lumpy. It tasted great though. We actually celebrated Thanksgiving on the Friday after. We had so much good food! Everyone pitched in and made it a great day.

The month of November was spent trying to work (details below) and cat-sitting an adorable kitten named Simba for another volunteer. When she finally came back to pick him up it made me realize how much I still miss Snowball and Beavis. I can't wait to see them again. The holiday season is making me a little homesick so don't be surprised if you get a phone call from me. I have skype now and highly recommend it to everyone!

We just got a meat grinder the other day and it has made our lives so much better! So far we've had hamburgers, spaghetti with meat sauce and sloppy joes, tacos and soon to come will be meatball subs. I didn't realize how much I missed ground beef. Now, if only we could get cheese here.

So...work...I've finally started working the last couple of months. So far, I've been observing classes at one of the schools that I'm affectated to. The other school will have to wait until January when the guy gets back who's going to translate for me (the director speaks very little french so that's been a problem). I have some project ideas and I should be able to find out how realistic they are at our in-service training in January. I'm hoping to get the school's well and latrine repaired, fence off an area for a garden, work on school murals, and start an eco-club. The eco-club should be a go in January. The teachers have students in mind, the club just has to be formed and we have to pick the days to meet. It's kind of daunting some days because the time is going so fast and it almost feels like 2 years won't be enough.

I've finally posted some pictures to the right and here's a link to my public albums. I'll try to keep that more updated. That reminds me of a funny story. So, obviously English is not the first or even the fifth language spoken here. Well, they misspell some things sometimes and one of the funniest to me had been signs saying they have a "pubic" phone available. I love it!!! Anyway, I went through a little bit of a funk so that's why I haven't posted here for a while. We'll be going to Nouakchott soon for Christmas and I may be attending my first mass ever. We've heard that the mass is really beautiful here. It's in French and it's full of ex-pats and I just want to experience something else new. After Christmas we're coming back to Kaedi for a couple days then going to Saint-Louis for New Years. That should be fun. It will be our first trip to Senegal since we arrived here in Africa. And we're going to be traveling through Senegal, which should be interesting. After Saint-Loius, we have to back to Nouakchott for Early Term Reconnect, where we get more vaccines (yay) and training. Then, after Nouakchott, my sector and ag-fo go back to Rosso for more training. I won't be back in Kaedi until the middle of January. Hopefully my projects will get off the ground then.

I'll try to keep this more updated. I miss you all!!! And thank you to everyone who's sent us anything. Anytime we receive anything in the mail we're so excited! Just knowing that we're thought about means a lot to us. I know I'm horrible about keeping in touch but I've been trying. I hope you all have a beautiful holiday season!

A Happy, Happy Birthday

So yesterday was my 31st birthday and it was a pretty good day. Not quite as good as my 30th last year when I was Super Irish but it was right up there. We had pizza with velveeta cheese, which was amazing, and some of the best macaroni salad that I think I've ever had. There was even a cake, made from scratch, that was DELICIOUS! And of course the company, as always, was awesome. Gorgol is definitely the best region in Mauritania, hands down :-) I could not ask for better site-mates. I really expected a kind of crappy birthday being away from family and friends from the states. I was very pleasantly surprised with how much fun I had. I never thought that my first birthday in country would be almost as good as the one last year (which for the record was by far the best birthday I can remember. In general I tend to hate them)

I went to my first Karate lesson yesterday too. We went back again today and we're going again tomorrow. I still haven't discussed how often I can go or how much it will cost. That will probably come up pretty soon. I haven't decided if I'm going to continue with the semi-private lessons or go to the school. The instructor is great but I have to admit it's kind of weird taking Karate lessons in French. Who knows, maybe it will help my French. It feels so good to finally have some physical activity in my days again other than the grueling walks to the market in the heat of the day. I never thought I'd be able to learn Karate in Mauritania, and at my site no less. Sometimes life is very funny that way.

We finally found a house. It's actually pretty big but it's a little expensive too. We're hoping to find a roomate during the school year. If we can get a Mauritanian teacher to live with us, I think that would help our language skills quite a bit too. The house has electricity and water. It needs some repairs, specifically plumbing repairs, but that should be taken care of Sunday, inshallah. There are three bedrooms, two of them with connecting baths (which means a sink, shower and toilet), a salon, a seperate douche and turkish toilet, and a kitchen. One of the bedrooms is on the roof, which I'm very happy about. That's probably the room we'll take once we have a roomate since we'll have a better breeze sleeping outside on the roof and it will be a little more private.

Speaking of sleeping outside, we've been doing that almost every night since we got to Africa when it hasn't rained. The sky here is absolutely gorgeous. I cannot believe how many stars I can see in the sky. Another thing I enjoy is the shortcut that we take to get to the market. I feel like I've stepped back in time when I walk that path...then we see a car coming towards us, squeezing through the alley past a donkey cart and I realize when we are. It's the little things that amuse me and I think they keep me sane.

Swearing In!

Just a quick blurb until later. We found out yesterday that we passed our language test so we could be recommended to be volunteers. So, in less than four hours, Brian and I will officially be Peace Corps Volunteers! This is probably my largest life goal to date that I've reached. It may continue to be the largest for a very long time.

Yesterday we played a very fun versions of Double Dare and we had the last town hall meeting (talent show) of stage. There were quite a few very surreal moments during the talent show. I cannot believe how many talented people there are here. I didn't do anything, but then I don't really have a talent :-) This is such a great group of people and I feel so honored to be a part of this!

We're okay, don't worry!

Just a real quick update because I have to leave for a session soon but if you haven;t already heard there was a coup d'etat today. The uprising happened in the capital, Nouakchott so that is the only place that volunteers can't go right now. Everyone's safe, we haven't seen anything, so don't worry about us. Here's an article about it:

Troops stage coup in Mauritania

It's a pretty dull coup :)

Anyway, other than that, we've still been pretty busy. We got back from Kaedi a week or so ago, which will be our site for the next two years. We both love it there. It is swimming with culture. The region itself is gorgeous. There is so much plant life. Unfortunately, there are quite a few bugs too but the trade-off, I think, is worth it. One of our region-mates has a dog. Her name is Kelby and she is adorable. Even Brian likes her and he isn't a dog person. Speaking of region-mates, ours are awesome! They are a great group of people. They put up with a bunch of sick stagiers for a week and were still amazing. I'll be honest, I did not want to go back to training. I wish we could just jump in now and start our jobs. I think these next few weeks are going to be really tough because we know what's waiting for us and we can't wait to get there. We haven't found a house yet but we did see one that we really liked. It's under construction right now but hopefully it will be complete soon after we get there and we can afford it.

I've been really sick for the past four weeks but I am so much better now! I feel better today than I have in quite a while. Hopefully I can stay healthy now for the next two years. I'm a little more wary of the food and some other things but now I know what to look out for. Other than that this experience has been great so far. All 77 of us are still here and that's pretty impressive!

We had our married couples retreat this past weekend and it was a very well needed retreat. It was nice hearing from current volunteers that they faced the same issues we are and how they dealt with them (mainly privacy and complete lack of control over our lives in training.)

Well, I have to go, the battery's about to die.

I miss you all! Write to me...please. I would love to hear from more of you.

Oh, if you've posted a comment and I might not have your email address will you please email it to me. My email is draconismoon@gmail.com. Even if you think I have it, I might not since I haven't had this address very long.

Quick Hello

Just wanted to say hi to anyone who actually reads this thing. I only have about 5 minutes left on the internet. Brian and I are doing okay. We've been very busy the last couple weeks. We find out where we'll be for the next two years later on this week so we'll keep everyone posted. I'll write more as soon as I'm able to. Miss you all!

Africa so far...

This is the first time I've had time to write anything since being in Africa. The days are very busy and very hot!!!! Our host family is really nice. They slaughtered a goat for us our first night there. That was...interesting. We actually have electricity and running water, which is nice. The food is better than I expected, for the most part. I don't care for goat meat but the fish is amazing. We have a lot of rice and couscous. We usually have breakfast about 7:30 which consists of a piece of bread with butter and of course tea. Lunch is usually about 2 or 2:30. My favorite lunch has been either the fish and rice with veggies or these fish ball things with rice and veggies. Dinner is usually at about 9:30ish . That tends to consist of goat and rice/couscous/macaroni noodles without veggies. I miss veggies with multiple meals! The mangoes and bananas here are absolutely delicious. I just bought a little thing of Pringles today, yummm. They were expensive but worth every ouguiya. All the trainees are together for the fourth of July today. We're going to have hamburgers, yay! I'll post more when I have more time. I miss you all!

To New Friends and Old Ones

It's been a while since I posted so this may be long. Brian and I arrived at staging this week. Tomorrow we leave for Africa and I can't believe the day is just around the corner. We have met some absolutely amazing people the last couple of days. I love our training group! I could not ask to leave with a more like-minded set of people. It's great to know that in everything we've been going through the last few months, we weren't alone in our frustrations, excitement, anxiety, you name it.

I flew in from Denver instead of Ohio because last week I was visiting my sister in Colorado. That was a great time! I was in a small mountain town that's about 8200 ft and a population of about 1400. After the last month or so of constant running around (which I'll get to later) this was a much needed rest. I didn't have to do anything or be anywhere by any certain timetable. It was the most therapeutic thing I could have possible done for myself. Normally, when I go on vacation I have itineraries of things I want to see or do or places I want to go but not this time. One of the many highlights was when my sister and I and a couple of her friends went on a small hike in a place called Hessie (?) that's at about 9000 ft with a beautiful small waterfall. There is nothing that brings a sense of calm like being out in nature. The five days I spent there were so restful!

The weeks before Brian and I left Ohio were crazy. We thought we had until the middle of June to get out of our apartment but it turns out we had to be out by May 31st to avoid yet another months rent (on top of the 2 to break the lease). Fortunately, I had quit my job the week before to get things in order for Africa so the entire last week of May was dedicated to packing, cleaning and moving. Once that was done we had mountains of other things to put into order before leaving. We barely had time to say our goodbyes.

There are so many people that I'm going to miss while away! To all of my friends and family, I hope you all stay in touch, you all mean the world to me!

PS: Send us stuff, it would be great! :-)