week one!

Hi friends! I've finally found the time to update you all on what I've been up to this past week. On Thursday afternoon the group of 41 Peace Corps trainees split up into its sectors and headed out for our first homestay! My sector is Youth Development and there are a total of 9 of us. We are currently living and working in San Ignacio on the Belizean and Guatemalan border.

My origional host family had to drop out at the last minute, so I'm currently living with another volunteer and her host family. In a few days, I will switch to live with another volunteer that is staying with a woman that speaks Kriol. The family I'm with now is amazing, so I'm a little sad that I have to leave...but since we hold Kriol language class at this house, I'll at least get to stay in touch with this new family.

To everyone at Elm City and beyond, the host family that I'm living with currently, as well as the family I will be living with in the future have most of the amenities that you would find in a typical American household. We have running water, electricity, the internet, mostly hot showers, and even a washing machine! I'm living in a city by Belizean standards so I don't have to worry about washing my clothes in the river....yet.

The clothes washing is really dependent on what region of the country that you live in and each sub-culture of a region has its own method of doing laundry. I'll learn whatever method is used in my final placement and if its different, I'll explain how I wash them then. I did attempt to wash my clothes in Belmopan before leaving for San Ignacio....unfortunately the room was too humid to dry anything and I had to pack damp clothes...needless to say, those are all terribly smelly and I'm in the process of rewashing them all as we speak!

Backtrack to last weekend when we traveled to the Mayan ruins...I have a few photos that I'm putting up here...this region still continues to impress me and the view I have each morning is breathtaking...its nice to know that even though my family lives at the top of the BIGGEST hill in San Ignacio, there is a reward at the end of the day after the long hike!

Hope you all are well and enjoying life in the states as much as I am here!