Well hello there friends and family,
I know that I wrote a blog recently on our reflection of one year, but I haven't discussed how things are going in our daily experiences. We have reached the one year mark....YAY! Things are really picking up for Nate and I.
Nate has several projects right now. He is extremely busy at his site placement. The organization that he works for is involved in Cocoa. Every year, Toledo District in Belize has a "Cocoa Festival". Friday is Wine and Chocolate Night. Yep, you guessed it, we (PCVs) volunteer for Wine and Chocolate. Its a great event to meet community members. Saturday is a day long event at the local park where they celebrate life, and especially Cocoa. Finally Sunday, the festival will then go to one of the villages to celebrate there. Nate is busy helping his organization with making a cool T-Shirt logo for the festival. He is also finishing TCGAs website. Busy guy. Besides his site placement, he is working to have the new PC forum up and running for the new volunteers. Thats right, the new volunteers are here. They are in their beginning process of CBT. Community Based Training. Thats when they get to live with a host family. Oh the good old days.
Speaking of Volunteers, Nate has been hosting 2 volunteers this weekend. Basically this means that 2 new volunteers came to PG to stay at our house. Nate had a BBQ at our house (he invited all the volunteers in PG...and their visitors) on Saturday. On Sunday they went to cave in a neighboring village. Today he took the volunteers to his site, but they also went to San Jose to visit Cocoa farms. Tomorrow they leave. All in all, an action pack but educational experience. 2 points for Nate.
Now as Nate took on these volunteers, I had training in BMP that I couldnt get out of. Friday I came up to headquarters to do a training for all of the new volunteers on Mental Health with our Nurse . Saturday I had Special Olympics Training and then Sunday through Wednesday we start the training for Peace Corps Belize's first Peer to Peer support group. I have to admit, I am kind of excited because I started this baby! I am excited to participate and train the volunteers in this initiative. It has been a lot of work, but definitely worth it.
Besides VSV (Volunteer Supporting Volunteers), I have been extremely busy with Belize's Special Olympics team. Team Belize. We have been getting ready for them to go to the world games. Lets face it, me and soccer...not so much, but I am great at being a soccer mom. Even better at catching balls. haha.
School is going well. A little over a month to go before school ends. We are going to paint a gigantic World Map on the library wall. Me and paint...now thats a funny thought.
Well, that sums up our work thus far.
Fun fact of the day....it doesnt matter how many rats you catch, it never end. They keep coming back.
We miss you all. Email us if you can. Dont be a stranger!
Love,
Michelle (and Nate)
