La Capital and Beyond

Well, we finally wrapped up our community based training with a basketball tournament and a very tearful goodbye. I mention the basketball tournament not because I played but because Spring and I were talking to some kids and they asked if we were sisters. When we said no, they said ´but you look so much alike!´ Now, for those of you who don´t know Spring, she´s half japanese.

As for the despedida (going away party) it was a very tearful goodbye to all of our families. In fact, I think all of us were caught off guard about just how sad we really were to go. If it´s this hard after five weeks, what´s it going to be like after two years?

So, yesterday we packed up our belongings in the bus, stopped at the dominican equivolent of a really nice truck stop (with really tourist prices, 40 pesos for a coke? robbery.) and made it back to the capital. It´s HOT here. Like sweating when you´re sitting still hot. Where the bucket showers aren´t even cold it´s so hot. But, thankfully we´ll be moving to our sites on Tuesday afternoon and only have one more week back here. My initial anxiety of not having a youth volunteer anywhere near me was abated last night at the carwash (yes, it´s really a carwash, and it´s also a bar. it is the place to party here) when I found out that 4 health volunteers, 2 CED volunteers, and few water volunteers will all be relatively near me. So now it´s time to pack again and move to the permanent home. I´m not really sure what internet access is in store for me so this may well be the last blog post for a while. But don´t fret, I´ll still report all the dirty, sweaty, and sunny details every chance I get.

vaya con dios.