Up and Running...for the time being!

Our internet crashed again…this has become the story of our life- however it’s up and running again- keep your fingers crossed that it works for at least the remainder of the week!

We have been keeping busy these last couple weeks. Last Monday we hosted the first ever environmental regional workshop- for the most part it was a success…I won’t get into how our supervisor somehow managed to squeak his way out of it because that would take me an entire blog entry to write! We have some new goals which are related to agriculture! We’re both really excited about this since we are working for RADA and a lot of the stuff we’ve been doing relates directly to farmers and agriculture.

We went to Mandeville to celebrate World Food Day- the food we were displaying was pumpkin, anything and everything made from pumpkin….sauce, chutney, jam, steamed pumpkin leaves, pudding, and the list goes on. I had no idea you could make all these things from pumpkin! While there Dr. the honorable Chris Tufton (the Minister of Agriculture) chatted with both Will and I- we haven’t seen him since being sworn in as PCV’s. St. Elizabeth is his parish and he has some projects that he thinks we can both work on.

We attended the Shrimp Festival in Middle Quarters on Sunday. RADA set up a booth to disseminate information and register farmers. It rained for a good portion of the day. We both ate lots and lots of shrimp… shrimp curry, shrimp punch, spicy shrimp dip, coconut shrimp, and shrimp chutney, I don’t think we’ll be craving shrimp anytime soon. While at the festival we began to take down our booth when who decides to show up….Dr. Tufton! Our supervisor saw him coming and frantically said- put the displays back out…the minister is coming! I started to laugh because I’ve never seen my supervisor get so worked up before. Dr. Tufton came over to our display and chatted with us. He told our supervisor not to take down the display- He said, “There might still be some farmers that have questions, you should stick around and answer their questions!” I was laughing the entire time- It was the first time our supervisor was whipped into shape, he reminded me of a dog with his tail between his legs! (The above picture is from Shrimp Festival - A cultural dance representing several apects of Jamaica)

Finally Monday was a holiday- Hero’s Day- Will and I went to Dunn’s River Falls in St. Mary- It’s quite the drive- took us about two and a half hours to get there. It probably would have taken longer if we had to take public transportation. I didn’t realize the place was such a tourist trap! The price to get into the Falls is $J300 which translates to about $4 U.S. The price for non-Jamaican residents $15 U.S. we explained that we were peace corps volunteers so they let us pay $J300. Once inside I was almost embarrassed to be white- Tourists were handing out money left and right – thank goodness we were with a group of Jamaicans! I came to realize why Jamaicans always try to get money from white people. When we got ready to hike the falls a group of tourists came up with a guide- they formed a line, held hands, and began climbing the falls as a group! Can you say LAME??? We were able to climb the falls independently without holding hands. We climbed the falls a couple times, ate the lunch we packed on the beach, enjoyed an iced cappuccino, and some cherry berry passion ice-cream. It was nice to have these luxuries while relaxing in such a beautiful place.

<---- Yeah that's an iced Cappucino!

This weekend we are going to Kingston for quarterlies. I applied to be on the SPA committee and was selected to be a member. I’m really excited I will have this opportunity especially since Jamaica is known for their SPA program. We’ll be attending meetings and hopefully get in some yummy coffee and American food! We’ll also cast our votes for the presidential election! I’m not going to elaborate on who we’re voting for and politics. My grandma always told me there are two things you should not discuss- politics and religion, therefore I will just say that we’re doing our American duty and voting for a presidential candidate!

<--- I ♥ my chacos!

P.S. I forgot to mention that mosquitos suck! They have reached an all time low! I was bit on the rear end by one! Does anyone have any idea how bad that sucks?? While riding the bus, sitting at work, or chatting with your supervisor and your butt itches so bad you can't concentrate on anything but that!

This is a typical Saturday- Handwashing Laundry

and praying that it doesn't rain :)