Last of the fiestas!

Round 3 of the out of site chronicles continues with the language taller and the fundraising party!

After a leisurely, stress free and overall inconceivable time at the finca, I returned to normality in a little pueblo called Nandasmo. Nandasmo is located in the pueblos blancos, not more than 5 minutes from where I did my training in Masatepe. Our entire training group minus the 5 or 6 people that were highly advanced at Spanish, returned to the training towns for a 4 day language workshop. We stayed at the houses of the trainees while they were on their site visits. The two sectors in training right now are Tefl and Environment. There are some overlaps with families from our training group, but for the most part these kids have new families. The environment group does their training in communities about 45 minutes away and Tefl is in the pueblos where we did training and thus our group was split between the two sites. The good thing is the Peace Corps mixed agriculture and business volunteers.

I had an incredibly warm welcome from my host family of 4 days. They were super accommodating, nice, and relaxed about rules and regulations. My learning was limited due in part to 2 Managua trips. I was required to go in for an ultrasound and an X-ray on Wednesday. This resulted in some pretty clear pictures of a bankrupt shoulder. The doctor immediately ordered an MRI which resulted in my second half day of training on Friday, what a shame!

As of today, I still don’t know the results. On Saturday after the last class everyone went to Managua to enjoy a night at the Holiday inn. The business sector hosted a fundraiser for the national business competition that will be held in the very same hotel on the 30th of this month. There were volunteers from all over the country and in every sector there. What a treat indeed. I had a nice conversation with the ambassador before parading around the party mingling with as many new people as I could find!

The week went by with a swiftness that could overpower any pessimist. I took a bus back on Sunday afternoon.

Monday thru Wed consisted of a weird unhappiness and drowsiness. All the time away from site really wore me out. I think I was a little depressed that pretty much every other one of the 200 volunteers has a site mate or someone within a day trip away. I am very isolated and it was hard to realize that I will once again be without any American company. Well for a short bit at least. We have to go back to Managua on the 23rd for a re-connect conference.

On a side note I have 11 people coming to visit me between now and April; a pretty astonishing number really. Hailing from 3 different countries to boot. The first visitor, Kevin will be here any day, followed by my friend Adam on the 29th of November.