Apologies for not posting sooner

It is all so strange, but not in the way you think. What strikes me most is how normal it all feels. I no longer think twice about sitting down on a toilet bowl without a seat, even if it is a toilet that I have payed to use (extra for tp). I then throw the purchased and used tp in the trash can, never in the toilet. If I don´t recieve both rice and potatoes on my plate at once, I wonder why. When a mean looking dog gets too close I pick up a rock off of the dirt road and know that I will throw it if need be (usually they run when you pick one up, they´ve been hit on other occasions). Spanish comes out of my mouth sometimes when I try to speak English, and other times I look right at someone who I know speaks only Spanish and I ask them a question in English, expecting them to respond. I now know that the capacity of a car or bus has absolutely nothing to do with how many seats or belts there are. I have ridden in a car built for 5 with 10 other people. As I careen down the road in a bus with standing room only (not much at that) I wonder if I should feel better, or worse, that the driver is crossing himself. I also speak freely with other volunteers about where our latest poop should be classified, (we have a 1-5 chart that the PC uses. Wes and I actually have a great bathroom with a flush toilet and a seat, so whenever other volunteers come to our house they use the opportunity to poop, which naturally leads to the conversation of what kind it was, whether it smells like sulfur (which means Giardia), or if it had blood or mucus (this is also a reason to call the PC docs, I think it means you have a bacteria). I have gotten very good at explaining in Spanish what the Peace Corps is, why I am here, and why my eyes are green (the 5 year old in our house is still trying to figure this one out).

For those of you who are also wondering what we are doing here in Peru. We go to class from 8-5 Monday through Friday, split between Spanish, technical, and medical training. Beginning today, we go to Lima every Saturday to a University called la Agraria which is pretty much a self sustained farm. We are learning organic gardening, we will also have a session on how to raise Guinea Pig (that´s right to eat), and a session on beekeeping. Today we planted a little area, and we will work on it every Saturday until we leave. On thursday afternoons we are doing healthy lifestyle classes at the local primary school, and today we had our first ¨English Club¨ which is another project we are doing to fulfill a PC training requirement.

We are having a great time, I love reading your e-mails and blog comments, more about what we are doing to come soon.