Letter to Lin and Shawn (6 Sep 05)

This is a letter to the Gillilands

I'm making my way here. Things are eternally slow, but steady. Classes are going well and I'm getting adjusted to the food. The food, of course, is nothing to speak of, except that it sucks and there's hardly any variety. It's based heavily on rice and millet and sauce from leaves of trees.

The people here have truly been the redeeming feature in all things. Friendly without fault and funny to no end. So gregarious and welcoming despite the lack of material things, it's amazing. I'm looking forward to the work and I'm hoping for the best. Still, 2 yars is beginning to yawn in front of me. I've started to set 3 month goals to stay focused. Every 3 months I have planned a vacation or event to look forward to. Hopefully along with friends I have here, the time here will fly and be enjoyable. In a few days we find out our site placement. The location we'll be staying for the next 2 years.

It's hard to know what to write to you guys. I'm hoping my previous letters are getting posted on my blog site, but I've yet to have access to the internet to see if it's true.

Along with no internet I received only one letter, from my mom, and that's it. If you could relay folks to write me letters instead of email, I'd greatly appreciate it. Mail comes to mean so much here, it's pretty frustrating when everyone who says they're going to write, doesn't. I can't get mad yet, cause people may be writing me emails and I don't know. But real mail is such a gift here.

As you can tell I miss everyone from the states quite a bit and so my sob story ends there.

My days are spent currently in Gourcy, a town of about 20,000 people and it hardly looks any different than one with 2,ooo. The only difference is, Gourcy has a fresh food market every 3 days and the town, Mako where I stay with a family and train doesn't. Most of all the houses are the same made of brick and mud, all one story and all the same color brown. Some buildings are made of cement and this are usually the churches or mosques.

Poeple, who can afford decent clothes, are vibrantly colored and adorned with beaded jewelery. Most however are clothed in what they have and are lucky to have thread to fix whatever holes they do have. The six sets of clothing I brought here is literally a plethora of outfits compared to locals, who literally wear clothes until they fall off their body.

The family I stay with, when I'm in Mako, I think has about 3 sets of clothes a piece, and they're pretty well to do. They look at all the clothes I put on the line to dry when I wash them and seem envious. They typically buy clothes once a year after crops are sold. Whatever they buy is supposed to lost all year until the next crops are sold.

I currently get paid about $4 a day. Meals are typically 75 cents and letters to the states cost a whopping $1.65, which is quite a chunk of my pay check as you can see. The meals alone are 75 cents, with a drink,like coke, it's another 75 cents. Beer, a liter, is about $1.60. To have pants made with fabric is about $5, an apple is about 50cents and a cucumber , because its local is about 10 cents.

All that seems pretty cheap but $120/month paycheck can get pretty tight if you start drinking too much beer, coke and eating an apple.

If you haven't already, heard I shaved my head a couple weeks ago and just now its starting to noticebly grow back. Right now about 3/4 inch, it feels like one of thse really think mink blankets. However, I do look a little too butc, so now I 'm working on getting my ears pierced sanitarily One upper and one lower on each. Pretty radical changes, I know, but it's Africa and why now.

I haven't lost much weight, right now hanging onto a stubborn 135lbs, but with a completely carbohydrate diet, I'll be lucky to stay there.

I need to write other folks and my pen just died, so I'll let you go, take care and all the luck in Thailand

always
Laura