A case of the Mondays

Sometimes here the weeks run together and Monday is just another day. This week was different in that Monday marked the start of an important week. First off, we were back from a great weekend at the beach, nursing sunburns, but glad to be home. The volcanic sand beach was beautiful and we stood out as Floridians among a bunch of mid-westerners because of all the time we (wiley) spent playing in the waves. In site we successfully initiated a string of water infrastructure projects that will wrap up in April (si Díos quiere), and this is the week that Reyna’s (Laura’s host mom’s) baby will be born!

Sadly, this Monday also marks the beginning of Wiley’s last week here. Time has gone by too fast and I am starting to realize how much I will miss having him here. Ever since I got my invitation from Peace Corps we have been scheming about how he could spend his interim here. It’s strange that its almost over. This trip was really the first time that I have gotten to spend extended one-on-one time with Wiley, and its nice to come to the realization that I actually like being friends with my brother. He helps me out when I go to work and leave important things at home (that happens more often than it should), he washes dishes, and most importantly, he makes me do Insanity. When he leaves someone is going to have to call me everyday at 5 and yell “Dig Deeper!!” He cooks which is a plus (he is making eggplant parm right now), but he also wants to teach my new mouse friend to cook instead of trapping it, which is definitely a minus.

As for the water projects, well they got off with less hitches than were expected, but that’s not saying much. The 6 masons and 10 ayudantes arrived bright and early at the work site to find that the Muni hadn’t delivered the materials they had promised. Disappointing, but not altogether unexpected. After chasing around at the hardware store and the Muni I finally (and accidentally) ran into the right man who explained some kind of mix up, wrote the materials we needed on a piece of scrap paper, and had them at the school within next few hours. I note the detail of the scrap paper because after all the official letters we had written and signed by various authorities in order to get the materials turned in on-time, it seems that all we actually needed was a note scribbled by the right person.

Well that’s about all for now, as I feel I should go spend some quality time with the lil bro instead of us both sitting at computers in different rooms. This weekend we are headed to the lake, so keep an eye out for an update on his blog!