Tuesday, July 26, 2011

Pagod Ako!

Life here in the Philippines has been wonderfully hectic, forgive me for the delay in updates! Where to start, Hm... the people. My host family is quite perfect I must say. I live with three people: lola sion (grandma sion) ate Elsa (sister) and my sisters son, Joshua. The neighbors are also relatives and the family has been living in Naparing for a long time, I'm not exactly sure how long, but they know a lot of people. Each day we chat or in Filipino tems, we chika-chika. Chika- Chika is funny because the community is so linked together so news travels fast. For example, everyone here knows I like coffee, everyone knew our companion Richard was lost looking for the internet cafe, everyone knows Catherine is 21 and the youngest volunteer. It is actually very comical to hear the updates about myself and other volunteers.

I am labeled as the lucky one because the house I stay in is absolutely beautiful. I have a room upstairs which is kind of like the attic. Aside from my dislike of the mosquito net and the mosquitoes that will forever like me the room environment is perfect. I will never forget the roosters who live outside my window- they will forever, well for the next two months, keep me up at weird hours of the night and be my 3am alarm clock- aka the primary reason why I drink a lot of coffee! Last night I was attacked by biting ants. This was definitely not my favorite moment but I survived and learned that you can buy a chalk like stick of white poison to put around your bed and windows to help keep those pesty little buggas away from otherwise comfy and relaxing places.

Earthquake! Eeeek. There was an earthquake last night, rather frightening being my first experience. In all honesty, when my bed started shaking I thought a) there is a monster under my bed or b) i am dreaming because of the malaria medicine we HAVE to take. As I lay, deciding what the heck was happening I suddenly heard the tip toeing of my family members and realized I wasn't the only one who was laying in a shaking bed. The good news is everything is A-okay!!

My community is small but I like it. One day walking to class I got splashed with mud because a bus went flying by and hit a puddle. I learned my lesson the hard way to not walk so close to the street. Also, the highway (sion calls it, the cutest) is very dangerous and she finally lets me cross the street all alone.

Language training is moving along pretty smoothly. One the days where we have only language class, for about 8 hours, my brain truly aches. My host family continues to laugh at me whenever I practice my target language, each new word I say they are extremely excited and have to repeat it and tell many others of my new words. On Thursdays we have medical training. I am not looking forward to it this Thursday because last week left me pondering about all the horrible diseases/rashes/bites I could encounter. Now, when I see a mosquito bite I get nervous because I am convinced that it may not just be a mosquito bite... very complicated emotions for an indecisive person.

To end on a happy note- Tomorrow is my birthday and my first day in the classroom at Paluymo High School!! Hooray.

Write more soon! xoxo.

1 comment:

  1. HAPPY BIRTHAY! never got your number or else i'd text you. hope you are surviving the typhoon. it's crazy here in benguet.

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