The holiday season has come and gone already! This is my first staying in my town - as much as I would’ve loved to go home for the holidays, my sister is getting married in 3 months, so it just wasn’t feasible. I miss everyone very much -Thankfully my parents and sisters sent packages to me, so I have presents to unwrap Christmas morning.
The holiday season started off with Thanksgiving. Twelve of the volunteers got together at a local resort & rented a house. It was a nice time, but the weather didn't really cooperate & it rained the whole time. Everyone made a dish & the food was delicious. My favorite part was having a spa day with another PCV, I miss doing girlie things.
Here is what’s been happening around town during the Christmas Season:
- Decorations
Many of the stores have decorated for Christmas – blow up Santa’s, balloons, streamers. And you can’t miss all of the Christmas music with a Fiji flare.
I also decorated my house a little. I had lots of pipe cleaners that have been sitting at my house for a year and a half, so I put them to good use. Then I made my Christmas tree & my parents sent me a stocking, Santa hat & small tree. I even put a “wreath” on my front door!
2. Parties
The nursing school had a Christmas party for the second and first year students, lots of dancing, skits, a gift exchange & delicious food. The students are really fun & I could tell they were excited for break.
The ladies from aerobics took me out for dinner and clubbing for Christmas – it was really fun (I had to leave early b/c I was not feeling well). They are so good to me, I am really going to miss them when I leave.
3. Cookies
I organized a cookie making day with some ladies from aerobics & the nursing school. Only a few people showed up & we had a great time (and made tons of cookies!). We made sugar cookies with icing, peanut butter cookies & delicious oatmeal cookies. Some who were not able to make it have requested another cookie day. I love sharing this part of our American culture!
4. Scenery
I am really missing the snow & cold weather right now (we’ll see how I feel this time next year). And even though we don’t have any snow, we have some very beautiful flowers all around town!
5. Last minute shoppers
Well I made the HUGE mistake of going to town Christmas Eve – it was the last day the store will be open for 3 days, so it was PACKED. I needed to get some cheese, and I waited about a half hour in line, with sweat dripping down my back the whole time. The people here aren’t very good about lines either – one woman tried to push her way in front of me after I had already been waiting for a while. Luckily all I had to do was look at her (the same way my mom used to look at me when I was little & misbehaving in public) and she knew not to even try it. But there were a few good things about going to town – I got 4 avocado’s for 50cents each! And I was able to stop in and wish Merry Christmas to some of my favorite people – Chetna & her husband (she does my eyebrow’s & comes to aerobics), the Chinese man at Color Dragon & Prim and his family at the shop across the street from my office. Oh, and I also got to see all of the goats for sale!
My Christmas Eve consisted of; trip to town for food, dishes, lunch, more dishes, watched the Christmas episodes of The Office, did some laundry, cleaned the house up a bit, developed a new method of removing the frogs from my house (trap them with my broom, put on a thick plastic glove, pick it up & throw outside), contemplated going to church – but decided I don’t want to go outside because of the mosquitoes & made my dinner- All the while, listening to Christmas music.
Christmas Day I woke up excited to open my presents. I called my mom while I was opening them, then called my dad & got a song from my nephew. I hung out around the house until it was time to skype with the family. My nephews wrote me a rap & it was awesome. I went to the pool for a few minutes, but it got cloudy & rainy pretty fast. Later that day I went over to have dinner with some other volunteers.
Next is the New Years adventure. To save cost, I decided to take a boat instead of flying. That was the last boat I'll ever take. It started out good, I tried to keep a positive attitude because I know how quickly my mood can change into something terrible. I was with couple other PCVs & had a great time talking and hanging out on the boat for a while, then it was bed time. We had to sleep on benches because the private rooms were more expensive than a flight. And we were stuck up in the top of the boat where the AC doesn't work, so it was very hot. Ok, so here are the things I was dealing with that evening: 1. Hot room 2. Cockroaches and other bugs crawling everywhere - I even killed one on my chest 3. People snoring 4. This one creepy guy who looked naked when he was sitting down, and would get up and say things to me like "you feeling sleepy?" in the morning he said to me "you didn't sleep all night, I was watching you" - weird. 5. Rocking boat- it was very rocky once we hit the open ocean. I still had the rockies when I went to bed the next night! 6. In the morning people were brushing their teeth (which is a very disgusting sounding thing here, trust me!) and blowing snot rockets into the sink by my head. Needless to say, I was not a happy girl by the end of that trip. I went straight to a computer and booked a flight home!
The next day we made our way to Dunarau to take the boat out to Funky Fish. 22 of us got together over the weekend & had a great time! It was so relaxing & the staff really took care of us. My favortie part was finally cutting another PCVs beard! He looks so much better! Other than that, I did nothing but lay by the pool the whole time, exactly what I needed.
2011 Holiday season was a success!
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