Hello again,

Sorry I haven´t been posting much on my blog. When I sit down to write something I am always either overwhelmed and don't know what to say or on the contrary, feel like I have nothing to say. Every single Peace Corps volunteer that I have talked to, past and present, says that the first three months of training are by far the hardest part of the experience. Only two weeks have passed and I already have tangible evidence justifying that statement. For me the hardest part has not been the culture shock, the language or trying to grasp the diversity of this country and her countrymen and women - those were the fun things! For me the hardest part has been sitting in classes for 8 hours every day learning what we all have to learn in order to do what we want to do when I would rather be out in the field working with the people. Just to give you some idea...here is a weekly synopsis:

Monday: wake up 6:30 (fucking dogs), language class 8:30 - 12:30, eat lunch with family 12:30 - 1:30, walk to technical classes 1:30 - 2:15, technical classes 2:15 - 6:00, walk home 6:00 - 6:45, eat dinner and chat with family 7:00 - 9:00, do homework for classes next day 9:00 - 10:00, tired = go to sleep.

Tuesday: do the same thing all over again but substitute technical classes for cultural classes.

Wednesday: take public transport to Peace Corps training center 7:15 - 8:30. Safety classes and Medical classes 8:30 - 5:30 (with a one hour break to eat lunch)

Thursday: same as monday but substitute 'walking around our communities attempting to meet people, understand their needs, and collect social statistics in an informal manner' for cultural classes.

Friday: Since my language level is SO advanced the peole from my language class and I get to do independent excursions around the city = whatever we want to investigate 7:30 - 12:30, eat lunch 12:30 - 1:30, go to training center to learn what the word 'work' means to Bolivian farmers 2:00 - saturday night. (last weekend we made an adobe greenhouse, put down three small gardens and a few seed plots then we learned how to change people's behavior so that the projects that we attempt to implement might be sustainable.

today, friday, was my first independent excursion. i went to the public university to try to talk to some literature and poetry professors. however, they are on vacasion until the beginning of march. sweet. that was a bust. after 30 minutes of messing with the computers, i finally figured out how to check out a book at the library and spent the next two hours reading about the origin of bolivian poetry.

Saturday: 8:30 - 7:30 work in the field some more at the training center.

Sunday: day with family.

OK, when explaining a normal week in words, it doesn't seem as bad as my mind internally is making me feel. However, I have felt very unpassionate, unmotivated, uninspired and uneasy lately. I think that this is due to the fact that much of the information that we are learning seems unnecesary or repetitive.

For me, the most profound knowledge has always come from experience, feelings, mistakes and personal contacts. I don't think that I would mind sitting in a class room all day if what I was learning was tangible or prodound, but it is neither of the two. you can't tell someone how to adapt to a culture, it just happens...

I am happy that I chose to do this (this meaning the peace corps), but I don't know that development work is my destiny. Either way I am looking forward to gaining a bit more freedom (right now we all have a 10:00 curfew), exploring the country some more (which won't happen for another 4 weeks) and attempting to reclaim the joy, passion and intensity that I seem to have lost somewhere on the plane while coming here. I think that the larger problem was the amount of time that i spent romanticizing about this experience. I know that things will get better, but romanticizing can be detrimental...welcome back to reality, erin.

That's all for now folks.