Here are some pictures of my site, Pejivalle de Turrialba!

It is hard to believe I have been in my site for more than a month already! It feels like much shorter. I encountered my first ¨hard¨days this past week. For the most part everything is going great, however, I think the language barrier caught up to me a little bit. I just got frustrated because I would be sitting in meetings that community groups have and at times I would have no idea what they were talking about. I have a hard time getting myself to say, ¨wait a second! I dont understand!¨ because I dont want to hold the meeting up to explaine things to me. However, I realize that this is absolutely necessary and I am working on getting better at politely interrupting for clarification.

I finally got matched up with my old 4th and 5th grade teacher, Miss. Feller, for the Paul D. Coverdell program. This is a correspondence program where I can mail letters, artowrk, photos, etc. to her current class in the US. This program is in place to help achieve the third goal of Peace Corps which is to promote exposure of Americans to foreign cultures. I am really excited about this program and plan on mailing a letter to her class each month covering all aspects of my life here and exploring the similarities and differences between the US and Costa Rica. I also want to involve kids from my community that are of the same age as those in Miss Feller´s class. This way they can have actual contact with someone who is similar to themselves yet so different.

I am definitely loving all aspects of my community. It is incredibly beautiful. I have found a ¨happy place¨(for you, DAD, haha) which is sitting by the river (I took the picture at right titled Río Pejivalle from this spot). I love to go here, sit in the sun, put my feet in the water, listen to the river, and think.

I will be getting a bicycle soon from the Peace Corps Office! This will be great because there are a few other communities that are technically located in Pejivalle but take a long time to walk to. I will be working in these communities so having a bike will make it much easier to get around.

Hope everyone is doing well! Much Love!

Emily