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Friday, 06 February 2009 02:26 |
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Blog Update - I'm having some trouble with the formatting of the other articles on the blog, but if you click the "read more" button on the bottom of the articles you can see the whole article. I had my first day of school today and I LOVED it! I am really excited to make lesson plans for next week! I'll update you as son as I can. I miss you all and really like getting emails from you - and i like real mail even more! Thank you for everything! -Blakey |
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Friday, 06 February 2009 02:16 |
Feeling Generous?
It is still possible for you to send me mail or packages! I spoke with my mom in October about sending me a package and she sent it on Dec 23rd. Since it takes about a month for packages to arrive, I see now that she is not going to be my main source for importing foreign goods (sorry mom!). I would like to give a shoutout to Grandma Larsen for the Christmas package though!
Although it is possible to get everything here I need to survive, some things are so expensive here it is ridiculous. For example, the 4 GB flash drive I got for $24 USD before I left is $400 WST – about $160 USD.
If you are feeling generous or maybe you did something bad and want to do a nice thing to balance out your conscience, you could send me a package!
I just put up a wishlist that you can look at below or from the link on the left-hand panel.
-DVDs of movies and TV shows – I didn’t bring many movies because I thought I would be too busy being peace corps all the time and getting involved in the community, working, etc. Well it turns out that I can’t integrate in the community 24 hours a day and living alone in the jungle means I get a lot of alone time. The TV show I most want is How I met your mother, because Alice keeps reminding me about how great it is (specifically season 3). If someone was really savy and had a lot of stuff on their computer, they could put it all on a flash drive or some dvds and send those – cheaper to ship.
Blakey’s Wish List
-spices – although some are available here, they are expensive. My friend Dan’s mom sent him a big bag of Parmesan cheese and I was jealous (snaps for Mama Conely). It might even be better to send the kraft kind since that won’t go bad on the journey. The other thing that would be great would be a pepper grinder and fresh pepper. The grinder can even be from the dollar store – if it grinds pepper I like it. The Samoan cuisine focuses on the…uhh… natural flavors of the food – no marinades, no spices, few condiments if any (except of course coconut cream which is delicious!).
-Coffee – Starbucks, Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf, Dunn Bros – anything! I have a French press and I like to make real coffee (instead of the instant stuff that is the norm here). Those little packages that make 1 large pot are good. I don’t have a grinder though, so pre-ground is better. It would be too much of a tease to send whole beans…so please don’t even though it would be kinda funny
-just add water food - Anything that just needs water added to it would be grand. Pancake mix, mashed potatoes, sauces, hummus, etc. Anything that can add a little variety to my diet of meat and colorless carbs would be a welcome treat!
-powdered drink mixes – iced ta is my favorite!
-Gifts for my Samoan Family – toys that are not battery operated for kids between the ages of 6 and 16. Coloring books and crayons, markers, colored pencils, or even just pens. Please no regular pencils (non-mechanical) because I saw a 9 year old sharpening one with a machete and it scared me). Things that allow creativity (arts and crafts) would be cool since that is not very common here. Even just little things from the dollar store – these kids have no toys so everything is novel. One thing I will say here though is that although they have no toys, they don’t have any less fun than any one else. I might even argue that the kids here laugh more and cry less than kids raised with tons of toys.
-Blank cds for me to make “hard” copies of software, resources and documents (lesson plans, yearly plans for classes, etc.) to give to my school, other schools and other PCVs.
-house decorations – I have a few empty walls so anything would be nice. I like to cut up old calendars because it give you 12 pieces of themed art, so that would be great. Or just pictures of you!
-clothes – any shirts – currently my 3 target t-shirts are the staple of my wardrobe. Only having 3 though means I have to do laundry often. Doing laundry here is a production involving a bucket, some manual washing and 1 day of drying (longer if it rains). Does that sound like something I like to do? No. These can even be shirts you have in your closet that you realize you don’t wear any more – send ‘em my way!
-Gummy Candy – sour patch kids, swedish fish, sour peaches,, gummy bears, etc. They are artificial enough that they can survive the journey here and they are so tasty!
Some things I do NOT need:
-Raman noodles. Talking with other PCVs, we decided this would be a horribly anticlimactic package contents, second only to Taro (a potato like vegetable that is the staple of the Samoan diet).
-Taro
-roosters or pigs – too many already living on my land
-coffee beans that are not ground.
-spam. It is not uncommon here. Another PCV’s dad sent him a single sized bag of spam and I didn’t think it was as funny as his dad meant it to be.
Thanks in advance to everyone and I apologize if I sound too forward! To get anything here you have to ask for it, so I am trying to acclimate. |
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Tuesday, 13 January 2009 02:25 |
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– or lack there of! Sleep is not valued here. Sometimes I slept for 7 hours in the village and sometimes I slept for no more than 1 hour in a row. It is just not valued here. At home, if I were to wake up my parents, for example, I would feel bad about it. Or if I was watching tv late at night I would turn it down. Not here. Here is a list of the things that keep me from sleeping at night: 1) Roosters – did you know they crow more than once a morning, because I was under the impression that it was only once and then they were done. Damn you Charlotte’s Web for giving me false hope! 2) Soap Operas – when I would go to be, sometimes my family would stil be watching soap operas. These are never in English (nor Samoan), but usually Philipino or Korean. My favorite part about these shows is their incredible lack of musical variety – there is one song for every “emotional moment.” It’s horribly catchy! “I…give my love to you…don’t hold back..give my love…etc.” over and over and over. |
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Tuesday, 13 January 2009 02:24 |
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I spoke a little bit earlier about embarrassing myself by eating palusami with a fork. This got me thinking about how often I have embarrassed myself here. The PC teachers told me that when you mispronounce a Samoan word it will become a sweaowrd. I though they were kidding, but they were not. There are a billion bad words in the language and I have accidentally said about half. Sometimes in class even. But I keep on talking even though groups of people will be laughing in my face. There is also the dancing – this is great. |
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