Saturday, October 30, 2010

Drumroll, please.

Here it is folks, the moment we´ve all been waiting for! This week we finally got our site assignments!

I will be in the region of Lambayeque, in northern Perú.

My site will be in the northeastern portion of the region, in the dry forest (bosque seco). Apparently, this type of ecosystem is very unique, and the only place similar to this particular forest is in Africa (Namibia, I think my director said). The weather there is pretty warm, and, obviously, dry most of the year. I won´t have to worry about altitude, because my site is at less than 500 feet above sea level.

My town has about 800 people (similar to my hometown in Kansas!). At least at first, my main counterparts will be the director of the school and a municipal worker. My host parents are both in their early 40s, and I have three host sisters, ages 21, 16, and 5. I´m still not sure if I will have electricity, but apparently I do have water in my house. However, I´m told I will have to use a latrine which is a little way away from the house and I will have to take bucket baths. If there is a shower, at least in the warm weather I won´t dread taking a cold shower!

One other volunteer from my group will be in a site about 20 minutes away by car, so that will be nice, and several other volunteers from previous years will be within 30 minutes or so. Another volunteer from my group will be about an hour away, another about 3 hours, and one more about 4 hours. The county seat, for lack of a better term, where I will probably have to go to use the internet, will be around 30 minutes away. The regional capital, Chiclayo, where I will have to go regularly for meetings, is about 3 hours away by bus.

Next week we are going on field based training as a group, and then on site visits to our individual communities. I am very curious to learn more about what is next for me!

1 comment:

  1. Hello Sara,
    my name is Mathilde and I have been a Peace Corps Volunteer in Northwest China (Lanzhou) for almost a year and a half. I want to transfer to work in youth development in Peru and am trying to contact PCV in that field in Peru to answer a few questions but PC China admin cannot give me the Peru admin contact. Would you mind getting in touch via email so that I can bother you with my questions or get in touch with any fellow Youth Development Peru PCV? I would really appreciated. Thank you so much. Mathilde, PCV China 15 (mverillaud at gmail.com )

    ReplyDelete