Update

Busy is not the word to describe what is happening with my life right now. I apologize for not posting with more frequency, but I must admit that when I get off of work, I head to bed and then start all over again the next day. Saturdays and Sundays are good for relaxing, except that if I don't do my lesson plans on Saturday or Sunday, I find that my week is even more hectic. I start teaching at 7:30 every morning and have my last class until 8:00pm. And the hour in between are anything but free. Currently, I am teaching 7 classes. Two of the private lessons will end this week, but I will begin another private class and a regular class on Monday. So, for a couple of days, it looks like I'll have 10 classes, but then after Wednesday, things should die down and I'll have 7, I think. I'm not even sure anymore...

The school is bustling. We are overflowing with students and opening a new course this week. David will teach that one. We have so many beginner level students that we decided to dissolve the advanced course we had (which only had 3 or 4 students) and replace it with a beginner course. This makes more sense for us. David is happy too because he likes teaching the beginners. I started a new course last week at the Maritime Institute of Mindelo. They are the organization who control the waterfront. So, now I am teaching at ENAPOR, the organization who control the commercial ports and the folks who control the smaller ships and the beaches. I am surrounded by water people. I will begin two courses this week, one for Enacol and the other for Shell. They are the two oil companies here. So, I've got oil and water.... Make of that what you will.

Other than school, I must admit to not having a life. My best friend here is Elizabeth, my former roommate and yoga guru. She has decided to leave Cape Verde after a nasty run-in with ISE. They were not respectful of her and she decided to not deal with it. Then, she wanted to change projects to begin work with an agricultural group and PC said NO. They told her ISE or America. So, she's leaving tomorrow. I am super bummed out. She is my best friend here and she is a great listener and wonderful yogi. Our yoga class is really not sure what's going to happen. We are going to try to pull together and teach it as a group. We'll see. I hope it continues to be a great class.

I am so overwhelmed right now that I haven't had time to step back from it all and see the bigger picture. I'd like a week off to just access what is going on in my life, but I don't have the time. I am trying to meditate and do yoga, but I have sorely fallen flat on that. I am recommitting myself to the charge this week in hopes that it will help me to balance my life and my feelings of stress.

Well, we are officially a SUCCESS. I am proud of us and of our school. My project at Nho Djunga also continues. We are folding 1,000 cranes for good luck. I'll try to get some shots of the boys and the cranes. We have a long way to go, but they are getting good at doing them. So, with teaching, volunteering at the orphanage, and trying to find personal time, I'm pretty FULL! Keep me in your thoughts. I have made my reservation home for Christmas, so at least I'll have two weeks of a break from here.

My HOUSE

Finally, some photos of my house and Jackson. The house is looking better and better. I hung pictures and my garden is all set up. I got lots of house warming gifts from my friend Steph! She is wonderful! Steph sent me a box full of plates, cups, silverware, tupperware, and a bar set with cute wine glasses. It's just adorable. I was so thrilled to get it. They say that after your first year in Peace Corps, people don't remember you and stop sending packages! Well, I was so happy to know that this isn't true. Now that I'm over two years abroad, I am still getting great stuff from friends and family. I'll take this time to solicit BOOKS. I need reading material. I am dying for a good book to read...

Sao Pedro

I believe I mentioned that I was invited to Sao Pedro, the beach near the airport, for a party. The party was for one of our students, Gorilla. Gorilla is a retired military man. Every year he celebrates the anniversary of his retirement with a big party out at his beach house. We had a nice barbecue and were able to walk down to the beach. It's a little too rough to swim, but it is a nice beach all the same. The town of Sao Pedro is absolutely beautiful. You'll see pictures of the water and the plaza. You'll also see some photos of the sand. The designs in the sand that day were cool.

Hiking Pics

Here are the hiking pictures from the hike on October 6th. I didn't go last Sunday. I was in desperate need of a day off from everything. So, I gardened and such. The pictures you will see here are of a hike down to Joao D'Evora, where I went when Brian came for a visit. This time we wore our swimsuits and ran through a sand river down to a hidden beach. We had our breakfast and then swam for a while. The waves were wonderful and the water was perfect. It was such a nice diversion. On our hike back to the city, my friend Toi decided that he and I should run the rest of the way, so we did. We tightened the straps on our backpacks and headed back up the valley and jogged up the side of the mountain. We got tired about half way up, so we decided to stop and enjoy the view. We ended up trying out our yoga postures on some rocks that stuck out. Everyone below said we looked graceful up there on the rocks on our eagle postures! It was a great day.

The best hike so far

Last week, as you will recall, I hiked up to Mount Verde for the fourth time. Today, I did a hike I've never had the pleasure of doing... I hiked around the bottom of Mount Verde. It was probably my favorite hike since I've been here. It was incredible. First, it is the rainy season, so there are some green patches on the island. The beginning of the hike included a walk through a grass hillside. It was so pretty. You'll see here the typical photos of the landscape, but today's photos include some greenery!

There are a few "typical" events that occur on just about every hike. First, I get great scenic views of the surrounding landscape. Okay, these look similar, but they are each differnt and show a different part of the island. Click on them and they get bigger and prettier. It was just a great day for pictures, I couldn't resist.

Second, I typically encounter at least one or two dogs.

Third, we have breakfast. Last night I baked brownies, so those were today's hit. Last week it was peanut butter cookies. I love to bake and cook, and lucky for everyone around me, I love to share what I cook.

Fourth, there are rocks, lots and lots of rocks. So, you will see here the various interesting rocks.

Fifth, after hiking through mountainous terrain, about 70% of our hikes lead to the ocean. Since I live on an island that is only about 15 miles wide, it's pretty easy to get to the ocean. Today was no different.

Sixth, I tend to get at least one shot of myself at the top of whatever it is we hike. I think it gives me a sense of accomplishment when I look back on the photos.

Seventh, there are always multiple abandonded buildings. This time there were some really cool old houses on the way down to the beach.

Eighth, I have to get shots of where we are headed and where we came from, providing perspective to the hike and showing my dear readers just how far we hiked. Today's hike took us about 6 hours! It was a long hike, but well worth it. In the first picture, you'll see the riverbed that led up back up from the beach area. In the second, you'll see Mount Verde, where we were last weekend. Today, we were looking up at it at the beginning and end of the hike.

Nineth, I am a sucker for photos of cool, different things, especially structures that you just don't see on a regular basis in town. I also love the artistic shots of trees and such.

Tenth and finally, I like to have a story to tell. This week, my story is about my former roommate Elizabeth. She coordinated a major beach clean-up project, which I think I may have mentioned here. Anyway, this was two weeks ago, and after the project they put up signs on the beaches that they cleaned to remind people to keep the beaches clean. Below is the sign from the project. It was so great to see the signs out. I wish she had been with us today, but she was on vacation in Fogo, so I'll be sure to tell her how proud I am of her when she returns. It was great to see part of her work left behind for others to see. The beaches did look cleaner than ever!

Water?

Two days ago I ran out of water. I got home for lunch and turned on my faucet and nothing. So, for a day and a half, I tried to call people and figure out how to get some water. I went up to my tank on the roof and discovered that it, in fact, was empty. So, how do I fill it up. Normally there is a valve somewhere that you can open to fill the tank. I finally found that and turned it on last night at 10 when I got home from teaching. The water came through and I figured I'd leave it on and fill the tank up. Well, at my previous houses, once you opened the valve, you could let the water fill and it would cut off when the tank filled. Apparently, that is not the case now. I let the water run and went to bed. At about 530, I woke in a panic as I heard water coming from the sky. It doesn't rain much, so I immediately thought of my tank. It was both raining and the tank was overflowing. Because of the rain, I can't estimate what was the tank and what was mother nature. At any rate, I am bound to have a major water bill this month! Great. I really hope I didn't waste too much water, but I have a feeling I did. It's hard to tell because it evaporates so quickly. I learned yet another lesson here in Cape Verde! When do I get to stop learning these kind of lessons???? Seriously.

On a different note, school is going great. I love teaching. My students are wonderful and interested. We are overflowing with students. We have 100 in the school and nearly 40 on a waiting list. I just wish we had more hours to teach and more classrooms in which to teach. We are limited with 2 rooms and 3 teachers. But, 5 businesses are currently pursuing us, including TACV the national airline. They are offering us free flights to the states in exchange for classes. It looks like a go and let's hope this pays for my trip home for Christmas! YEAH!

** A note. I can't get the pictures to work right, so they look pretty bad in the display, but as always, click on the individual photo and you can see it better! Sorry for the trouble this may have caused, seeing as looking at my blog photos is likely the highlight of your week! :) Peace!

This morning, we hiked Monte Verde (green mountain). I have been up this mountain 4 times now and it is still amazingly beautiful. Today it was foggy, so we didn’t get great views of the surrounding scenery, but we did get to pick bags and bags full of spinach. After our hike up, which you can see by the pictures was breathtakingly gorgeous, we had our usual breakfast time and then gathered up about 8 grocery bags full of spinach (this was done with some help from four dog friends that we made along the wayNeedless to say, I got home and on my newly purchased stove, I pulled together a delicious spinach-potato soup. And, in my newly purchased fridge I stored the remainder for something tomorrow. I haven’t decided on a dish, so I’ll keep you posted on what I make with my remaining spinach leaves!

In the photos, you'll see a picture of what looks like screens help up in the middle of the air over a concrete slab. That is exactly what it is! Screening is often placed in areas with lots of fog. The water droplets are caught on the screen and drip down to a tank. The tank is reserved for drier times! Pretty cool, huh?

As you can tell by the mention of a stove and fridge, after 3 weeks of nothing in my house, I now have the ability to cook and keep things cool and fresh. I also bought a mattress to replace the piece of foam a friend let me borrow. My house is slowly becoming a home. I also got all of my plants from Elizabeth, and I plan to get to the gardening this week. I hope to have time, but we start school tomorrow morning. I am sure to be busier than ever (which I can’t imagine possible at this point). We have nearly 80 adult students enrolled! That is amazing. We are now registering the high school students and anticipating over 100 of them. We have already had to turn people away from the adult courses because we are FULL! I have a 7:30am class that begins tomorrow morning, a private lesson at 11:30, then another course at 6:30. The private lesson has been going on for 2 weeks and is wonderful. I really have enjoyed teaching Senor Adriano, the CEO of Enapor. He is a great man and really, really dedicated to learning, which makes being his teacher so much better.

Let’s see, what else is going on? Oh, I have so much to write, but so little time. I wanted to mention that I recently ran into an acquaintance on the street. He is a guy from Senegal, so he and I are both non-native Creole speakers. We communicate in Creole, as it is our only common language. It occurred to me after our conversation that language is an amazing thing. I suppose I know this, but now that I am teaching beginning language learners, I have added perspective. I am accustomed to teaching college students. My students here at ISE have a high enough level of English that they understand me. I realize that my task is more complex this time around! I have to successfully teach people who have no background in English. I am getting a little nervous about the number of hours I will be teaching per week. It will be A LOT. Once the high school students begin, I’ll be teaching at least 6 or 7 hours per day. That’s insane. I have a feeling that I am going to age about 10 years in this next one. I am both excited and nervous about what lies ahead for me. I am trying to figure out how to balance my work and my personal life. I don’t really have a personal life, but I need time off!

Keep me in your thoughts as I embark on this new journey. It’s already been a challenge. I am overwhelmed by the positive response we have gotten from the community. It’s been amazing. Enjoy the photos! I miss you all.