PC training - Week 4

WHO: Essa (aka Vanessa)
WHAT: Peace Corps, Environmental Education
WHERE: Nicaragua
WHEN: Sept '05 - Nov '07
WHY: La vida es un carnaval

Here's my training group - Celine, Noemi, Marcy, and me! We average about two Eskimo ice cream cones a week.







Nazareth and I painted our toenails one night. She told me the brownish color I chose was feo (ugly), but the only other options she had had glitter in them. Six year olds tell it like it is.

Though Maura thought I was crazy to take this photo - I wanted to show you all what a typical meal looks like. On the left are maduros - fried sweet bananas. On the lesft is gallo pinto (literally "spotted chicken" - for the color, not what's in it). It is made of beans and rice. I get this every night, and some days for lunch too. There are fried corn tortillas, a salad of cabbage and carrots, and finally a piece of salty white cheese. Maura is a great cook!

We made chocolate "chip" cookies this week. There are no chocolate chips, nor brown sugar, but appropriate substitues were found. These pictures show our round 1 results, and then the ones we had more success with after we tweaked the recipie. Nica flour, brown sugar substitue (called "dulce") , and baking powder all all different than what I'm used to.

Our training group did did one more charla in the schools - I did mine on the time it takes different trash to decompose. It went well and everyone was surprised when they found out plastic takes 500 years to disappear. We talked about choosing responsibly and trying to reuse and recycle.

Good news - Maura took one of the roosters to the mataderos (butchers). Hooray! Only three more to go! They like to hang out right outside my bedroom and crow all night.

Classes are finally getting a bit more challenging - we've made it our goal to get through all the forms of the subjunctive tense - something none of us have ever had good lessons in. We're also working on breaking bad habits we've formed over the years of getting by with what we know.

On Sunday, we will all be heading out on our own for a three day visit to a town where a current volunteer is serving. Everyone's looking forward to a break in training, a chance to see more of Nica, and what a volunteer actually does.

Thanks for all the emails! I've put all September photos up on Snapfish - check them out at:
http://www.snapfish.com/share/p=169301128120076839/

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You'll have to create an account first (it's free) and then click "view photos." I hope it works...