August 21st

My first full day at site:
Wow so here I am. It is real. I got dropped off yesterday by peacecorps at my house. I met with a representative from the village government, ate some lunch did a little shopping in town then peacecorp left with the other three volunteers I traveled with. I was able to have out with two of the peacecorps volunteers who have been here for a year or so now last night and a little today. I am begining to start to meet my neighbors. I have a doctor who lives across the street with his family and a 20 year old male who lives next to me with an older lady. He is trying to go back to school and speaks wonderful english. Today I cleaned my house a bit and just roamed around the village. I live in a larger town which is nice because I will have access to alot of resources, but has the downfall of not being that small community. I have taken pictures of my house, and hopefully will be able to post them sometime soon. I have a three room house. It is a kitchen/living room, my bedroom, then a spare room. I have a large cemented in court yard in the back which I love. There are already some plants growing there, and hopefully soon I will be able to add more to that. I have electricity, and a water spicket in my backyard. Things are so different now that I am not at home stay. It is weird having to boil my own drinking water, warm my water for my bath and cook my own food. I think it will be nice once I get situated, but right now I just miss the simple things. My house has a beuatiful view of Mount Hanang(the 4th largest mountain in TZ)along with all the wild plants that come with it. It is very green here, and right now is the dead season. I heard when it is the raining season the plants look surreal with the bright colors. I am so exicted to climb the mountain with the other volunteers. It can be done in onew day, but it is recommened to stay the night up there. Right now the temperature is around 70 degrees which is nice. At night it gets done to around 45 which can be quite chilly, but I have plenty of blankets. My house is right by a main road which is getting paved. It is a huge proect and they are paving over 150km. It should take the next five years. With construction comes lots of dust. There is lots of dust all the time everywhere including my house. It hasnt been an issue yet, but we shall see. I have a dog left by the previous volunteer. His name is Batman and is a black lab mix. Because of the weather he is able to sleep and stay outside, he follows me everywhere. I dont really take care of him, because he is able to find his own food and water, he just stay at my house. My house is very close to a primary school. This means I see kids all the time coming and going. I think it will be good for me to be that close. Also there is a soccer feild close by. I heard that there is not a soccer team set up, so that might be on my list of things to do. Since the road is so bad it will be very difficult to have commetitions, but I want to figure something out. My fellow volunteers are an hour to 4 hours drive in my region. There are seven total. The four that just got installed yesterday, two education volunteers and a health volunteer. I was able to meet the health and an education volunteer yesterday and they seem very excited to have us. Back to the road issue, since it is under construction travel any where in the country will be very time consumming. I think it will take me atleast a day to get anywhere. To travel all the way south where friends of mine from class have been place it may take four days. Tomorrow I plan to explore the village with my neighbor. I am going to look into buying a couch for my house along with buy some charcoal to cook with and some other odds and ends. I want to get a grasp on the city and figure out where things are located. My mailing address is now listed above. I have heard that mail is pretty quick and easy here which is nice. I have been told if packages are sent, send them in envelopes instead of boxes, because they have a higher success rate. For the next three months I am suppossed to get intragrated within the community. I think it will be hard because of the size, but I am willing to give it a go. I am also suppossed to set up contacts with futer job opportunities and find someone who will come to trainings with me. I am excited to go out and find what the village needs and wants from me. I am in site that has had around five previous volunteers. The village is used to having a peacecorps volunteer around which is nice, but I want to leave my own mark. I have internet access in town which is like a ten minute walk. It is kind of expensive so I am going to look into getting a wireless card. All is well right now. It is a bit overwhelming thinking about all the things I have ahead of me, but I am going to take it one step at a time. Well I will talk to you all very soon I hope. Now that I am at site I will be able to figure out a more concrete schedule for internet and such things. I hope all is well. I love and miss you all so much.