A lot of the frustrations of my job came flying at me all at once. Eg, limited ability to control my life and my work, inability to plan due to irresponsibility from others, coworkers pulling out of comitments at the last minute, etc. And through all of it, I got sick and my boyfriend and I decided to pick fights with one another. It was a good couple weeks of "mierda".
The good news is I strong-armed a coworker into following through on her commitments, gave myself a break on the plans I had as being able to complete them were out of my control, and did a lot of yoga, meditating, and working out. My body is actually starting to look like an athlete again! No more skin and bones lulu.
A presentation another PCV and I gave last week received great results. The plan is a nutrition program where a chef, my buddy John and I travel to different towns in the canyon and give a short lecture on nutrition and then teach them how to cook some well balanced recipes. We presented to the Rotary club and not only do they love the idea, they want to make it bigger. I love their high hopes and positive attitudes. I have not allowed myself to get over excited and the other volunteers and I decided that we should start with the 9 towns and project originally planned for, then, we can tweak it and begin to look at expansion. My biggest fear is that they will talk forever about making the project bigger ad bigger and we will never actually DO anything. So, the rotary is fund raising for the nutrition lectures as we speak, and our project is ready to hit the road whenever they hand us a check. This is very good news.
Meanwhile, my curriculum continues to develop. I am in the third and final section (the self: exploring the body and mind) and it feels oh so good to be wrapping it up. The biggest hold up is myself. I keep doing more and more research and communicating with more and more professors and graduate students all over the United States and Europe in an attempt to make sure that the methods I am using are the best we know of.
Another meanwhile, my study on play and language learning continues at The University of Texas Child Development Laboratory. We now have enough subjects to start looking at the preliminary stats. It looks like we just might prove that teaching kids words through play instead of in lecure/flashcard form works better for long term remembering. SUPER exciting. I just wish I could be there, but the Research Assistants are doing a FABULOUS job handling the study on their own with me on the other side of the world. Thank you a thousand times Jenny, Danny, and Trish! This study having such a good preliminary TTEST gives me a big something to look forward to returning to the US and fills my empty gaze off into the sunset.
Soon, it is 50th Anniversary Peace Corps party time. First in Arequipa, then Lima I will be formally celebrating with my coworkers, NGO workers, and government official folks in fancy dresses. I am not sure if the "parties" will be boring beyond comprehension or slightly enjoyable. I am hoping for at least slightly enjoyable at a dry formal ceremony with Limeneans.
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