Homeward bound… Sort of...

So as I packed up my belongings and started the move from my hostfamily’s house to a one-room apartment (with a kitchen and an INDOORtoilet), I got to thinking about packing to go back to Texas for avisit in July. Then that got me thinking about how it had been aninsanely long time since I wrote everyone back home. I think part ofme was fearful that, after the enthusiastic responses I received frommy stories about ice skating through winter, people had much higherexpectations of my writing abilities.

First, I apologize for having not written in so many months. After thesnail speed crawl of work through the winter, life has been moving atcrazy p erson speed ever since the start of April. This is partiallybecause on April 1 all of the new volunteer showed up and since Ilived in a training village I suddenly had almost 15 new site mates.It was crazy! At first I was like “OOOooh new toys to play with,” butthat quickly turned to a “ooo these trainees are individuals withpersonalities too, how boring.” After about three weeks I finallystarted to get used to their presence in my town and began to becomefriends with them. However, aside from my newfound playmates andalmost daily fun time after work, I also helped out with variousthings throughout the entirety of the K-17 PST like doing a fewtechnical trainings for the SOCD and the Health groups and helpingwith the training for the permanent host families. I am sad that theirPST is over because it provided me with a lot of extra work and playtime to keep myself thoroughly occupied for almost three months. Ithelped to rejuvenate me and showed me how far I have come as avolunteer. Although I miss having my new friends within walkingdistance, at the end of the day I am glad that it is over. Onceeveryone left, I got to move into an apartment. (Another volunteer hadbeen living here previously during PST) It’s like I am starting awhole new era of my service. It’s exciting!

Back in March, we had our Project Design & Management conference.Essentially, for three days volunteers and counterparts were splitinto three language groups and learned how to design/manage a projectand how to write a grant. At the end of this conference, each pair ofvolunteer and counterpart put together presentations on a potentialproject that they could do in particular their village or city. Mycounterpart and I had designed a project to give a felt handicrafttraining for the women in our Self-Help Groups because they make felthandicrafts. After the conference, we went back to site where mycounterpart and I wrote a grant for this training, which, as of a weekago, has been funded!! Writing the grant was a time consuming butexciting experience. The ladies are so excited that we got the fundingand I am looking forward to working with them on this project over thenext few months.

The other grant I am currently working on is to do a Leadership themedcamp in August with the volunteers in my oblast. It would be fundedwith money that was left over from our PEPFAR Winter Camps. It couldbe a lot of fun.

Mostly right now I am looking forward to my three weeks at home. I’mso excited about it that it is hard for me to concentrate on muchelse. AHHH!!!

I promise to try and do a better job in the future about updatingthis. Also, I don’t know if I mentioned it before, but if you arebored and wanting to read more about what is going on in Kyrgyzstan,we have a website that lists all of the Peace Corps blogs. Here is thelink: http://www.peacecorpsjournals.com/?showcountryinfo,kg