ramblin's.

leogane (the home of our first temporary residence and DSI headquarters - also the place i first had a fried egg sandwich)

quick trip to the DR on a 'free day' (no border fee). we passed in Quanaminthe at Massacre River. {pictured L-R: Michael (pres of DSI), Nancy (community health educator), Alliance (our teammate), and Stevo}

Miguel, Michael, + Alliance (all-ee-ance)

It's been awhile. Half a liter (metric system, baby) of bug spray and a hundred oh-no-my-eyes-are-glazing-over-i-wish-i-understood-what-you-are-saying-oh-i-think-i-got-one-word conversations, and I am still kickin it and lovin life in Ayiti.

A minor recap and ramble of sorts:

Last Thursday we departed our Hilton-esque Homestead in Leogane and headed to a small town outside of Cap Haitien (or OKap, as the natives roll) via Port Au Prince. This means that we got to jet up via plane to the northside of the country. If we were to have taken public transportation or rented a taptap (a common form of privately-owned public transportation here, in addition to motos of course) it would have taken 10 hours by land. By air it took only 30 minutes. It felt like such a luxury. It was.

We landed in Cap and then headed to Tibo for our first real DSI event. I have finally found a grasp on what our role is here and what our objectives are (i'll save that for another time), but for now, feel free to peruse their website, at your leisure.

There was a 3-day Water Technician Training, last Monday-Wednesday, during which I did nothing but sit in the back, listen, and magically began to distinguish between words! It is really easy for 3 sentences to sound like one giant word in Kreyol (like any foreign language), but you can't imagine my brimming happiness as I began to recognize a few of them. Pre-Haiti Kreyol studying is paying off and actually being here motivates me to study everyday. I am sick of feeling so helpless and incapable of expressing any sort of meaningful emotion or thought.  So, we began formal Kreyol lessons with one of our teammates here yesterday. By the way, he is slightly of rockstar status. Speaks English, French, and Kreyol and used to be a Radio DJ. Clutch, in the words of J. Blackburn. You must meet him soon.

So, here we are in Ferrier (another small rural community in the North; this one near the Dominican Border; and the one I first visited in 2008) staying in a guesthouse, beautifully run and far smaller and quainter than our first location. It feels really good to be here, and we already got to visit some old friends here!

Monday begins our 3 week backpack-by-moto-and-taptap trip around the Northern part of the country. We'll be visiting all of the technicians that were at the Training in their hometowns. I'm thrilled to tour the country and still call it 'work'.

Who am I kidding? I'm a total tourist here. Boy, I hope that feeling fades.

N'a we yon lot jou (see you another day)!