Regional Meeting in Huancayo

So I'm spending the weekend in Huancayo, our regional capital. Most Peace Corps volunteers have either 3-year Volunteers or people hired as Regional Coordinators to stay in the capital and organize meetings and support the nearby Volunteers. Unfortunately, my region (Junin, Pasco, and Yauyos) doesn't have any sort of support like this. We don't have any office or Peace Corps building we can stay in except that in Lima. Anyways, we organize our own meetings and meet up about every month or so. This is our second meeting, and I arrived late Thursday night. Being somewhere somewhat warm, with wifi access, and a shower is incredible.

Today, I received my laptop. I coordinated with one of the Volunteers who went home for Christmas to bring back a laptop for me. I've been waiting and  so excited for this. I'll finally be able to watch some movies, or TV shows at night when it's too cold to do anything else. I can write up documents for work, and finally put my photos all in one place to view. Seriously, receiving this laptop has been the bright spot keeping me moving for the last few days. I was sick since Sunday with the flu so staying positive and active hasn't been possible. With this, I feel like a new person. It also helps that I had a wonderfully hot shower too. And right before that I went to PlazaVea, the large Walmart-esque grocery store where you can find things all in one place and things you can't find anywhere else. Like Peanut butter. Although, I made my own peanut butter a couple weeks ago, which I'm very proud of. I spent a solid two hours going through the aisles finding all the potential things I can buy in the future. They have maple syrup and a barbeque sauce. I didn't buy them, but I was very happy to see that I could. I did buy some spices finally, and baking pans. I also got cream cheese which I'll have to devour soon. I was very very frustrated to find that they don't have cheddar cheese. They have Gouda, but no cheddar. I cannot understand or accept this. I have to eat cheddar cheese soon. Hopefully I can find it in Lima. Cross your fingers.

My future plans for work include doing a Tree Survey. I've become excited about creating a formal scientific-ish vegetation survey where I can document the condition of all the trees in Vicco. I'll make a labelled map too. Then I hope to repeat process every few months or so. And maybe the next Volunteer can keep it going. Other than that, I'm teaching my 3 hours every Monday/Wednesday, and starting this Tuesday/Thursday I'll be doing two hours more working with the other Professores who started Vacaciones utiles suddenly this last week after not coordinating or helping me whatsoever. But...no complaining, I'm happy. I had soft-serve icecream, and am going to have pizza for dinner.

This weekend is going to have to keep my spirits up through the rest of rainy season I think. So going to head out now to make that happen. Let the downloads keep going while we're out.