Friday 15 June 2012

A compilation of the most interesting pick up lines

A compilation of the most interesting pick up lines Brandi and I hear:
Fluffy n nice
Hey nice lady
Your skin is so clean
Him: Let's have sex! Me: No, I'm on my way to church. Him: After! (can't make this stuff up)
Explicit tellings of what they want to do us.
I want to rub lotion on your skin
Can I come with you/can you carry me with you? (yes I really want you to come grocery shopping with you on public transprortation-- that's my idea of a date!!)
You will bring me home with you. (I had no idea you can predict the future!)
You're married? That's ok you need two!
yah sexy
PSSSTTTT (times 14 million and usually screamed, who knew you could scream that?)
I like your shape/size
EY WHITEY (you know my skin color!! omg! your so observant!)







Monday 11 June 2012

Greetings from Cockpit Country


The Jamaica list thus far

things I love about jam:
the size
the beauty
most people
patties
dancehall
white rum
cheap veggies/delcious fruits
driving way too fast

wtf things:
heavily bandaged hospital escapees
goats, everywhere.

things I hate:
smalling up
abused dogs
extreme religion
mosquitos
water lock offs
Jam time (aka a half hour late-- I thought I was late till I came here..)

Greetings from my rooftop in rural Trelawny! I am currently overlooking the beautiful mountains of Cockpit country. A lot has happened since my last entry. I moved from the bat cave into a beautiful family home. I now have my own tv with cable(!!), 5 windows(!! aka no more moldy clothing), a washing machine(!!) and my own entrance and exit. I basically just share a kitchen. My homestay sister is 31, she's also a teacher and awesome. my homestay brother is around the same age, also really cool and I enjoy spending time with both of them.  My homestay parents are are sweet but very religious-- the other day I ran into my host mothers room hearing wailing. I open the door and she is kneeling begging for God's forgiveness like she was crying. I slowly  backed away without her noticing my presence. I've never heard anything like that before.. it was alarming to say the least.


The past few weekends I have been visiting other PCV's at beaches and other rural areas so I decided to keep this weekend to integrate despite other pcvs going to Ochio Rios. It ended up being worthwhile because I  had a great conversation with my homestay brother for the first time and found a co-worker at church. This sunday's church by the way, was a pentecostal five hour long service led by my host mother which I begrudgingly agreed to despite my strongest objections. I only went to the last three hours of screaming  and reptition of the same statements, yet it was still maddening and needless to say I will be back to my usual church the following sunday.  Upon returning from church, my homestay mother informed me that she had a vision from the lord to preach and thus she became a pastor. While I very much respect her religion and beliefs, the screaming and wailing sort of freaks me out-- I guess its something I need to get used to.

Extreme religion is definitely an integration struggle for me, as is life here in such a rural area. The bush is slow and chatty (aka everyone talks about everyone else) and its taking time to get used to the lack of things to do and the chattiness. A lot of times I find myself sitting on this roof blasting music and writing letters. I've also developed a love affair with 100 Jamaican dollar burned DVD's from street vendors. For a little more than 1 US dollar my sanity is kept intact with illegally burned dvd's of crappy American movies. Thank God for piracy. 

As far as work is concerned,  school has been going fairly well considering its only a few weeks in and I have done a lot of teaching (and have gotten to know most of the teachers.)  I teach full classes of 3rd to 9th graders multiple times a day. I usually do HIV education, however I have also been teaching various other life skills such as goal setting and emotional health.  I created an HIV monopoly game, and a few other games to simultaneously interest and educate. While there are classes I simply cannot control, most kids seem to enjoy and behave in my classes,  particularly the 9th graders. After each class they ask me when I'm coming back and become upset if I can't return immediately. I'd like to think my education is effective, but I will never really know how many students are still participating in risky behaviors. My attention is still being pulled in so many different directions-- the principle is retiring and wants me to begin the school farm Tuesday to help with many students inability to afford breakfasts, a cop wants me to start a group for sexually abused children, my supervisor wants me to do a literacy group, etc etc. I could probably live here for 15 years and not complete all the projects needed so I guess its a matter of time before I feel out which projects will work and when. 


Oh here's a fun fact, I went into kingston for an HIV meeting, and had Armageddon of the body for 24 hours due to Yao's chinese food. Who knew tofu could be used as nuclear warfare? No more Chinese food for me, lesson learned. Right now I'm looking forward to a few important visitors in a few weeks, learning how to control my classes, and ATI (the biggest party in Jamaica in August.) That's all for now.

One Love,
D