All Smiles

I made a new friend today--female, which are few are far between here. They seem to disappear once they reach age 16...don´t ask me where to, but i think it involves having babies and slaving over a a wood-fired stove top. The new English teacher is awesome! She is 25, hip, and really outgoing. She has promised to teach me to dance in exchange for help with her english pronunciation. :)

I have yet to become jaded with my life here, though recently it has become a lot more, well, ¨Peace Corps¨. We no longer have running water in my site. The rains carried off the pipes and the whole town is without running water. They won´t be able to begin reconstruction until rainy season is completely over. This is the one time in my life that I wish I had a letrine like the rest of the community, because flush toilets that don´t flush, are rather disgusting. Bathing has become a luxury. I won´t divulge how often I enjoy said luxury, but lets just say it is not frequently. Three times a week the municipality delivers 3 buckets of water per household. The system isn´t ideal, as my family is just 3 people, while others have as many as 15 people living together. Also, the delivered water is from the thermal waters in the next town over and has a high sulfur content. It is useful for washing dishes, and bucket flushing the toilets, but not great for consumption. While we do have a river, we have to cross the chacras and then this swampy land and thorny brush to get to it..not the best conditions for hauling water. All that said, I am slowly getting used to life without running water. It is amazing how well you can live on such little water. You really don´t need that much to get clean or wash dishes. I can´t believe how much water I was wasting before all this happened.

Despite these minor hardships, life is good. I smile everyday at the beautiful landscape that surrounds me, the warm people I encounter, and the amazing experiences I have. I apologize for being out of touch with life back home, but that really just means that I am having the time of my life here. Please don´t worry. love you and miss you all.