God, this is the Peace Corps!

For our juramento, one of the (now) former Peace Corps volunteers was asked to give advice for the new volunteers. His resonse: "Each day, take time out to look up at the stars and say to yourself: This is the Peace Corps; God, I love the Peace Corps."

Here are some of those moments for me during the past week:

1. Watching one of my jovenes practice pelota, or baseball, at sunset. Yup, he's definitely going to sign with one of the teams....

Honorable mention: Playing soccer at dusk in the commmunty. Watch out Brazil, the DR is coming...

2. Playing UNO with the family while enjoying a Friday afternoon breeze. When the family starts discutiendo over who says "uno" first or who "skipped" who, you know it's officially been adopted as a Dominican game and that they're addicted....

3. Tostones for breakfast. Enough said.

4. Hearing my little brother call my name every morning: "Lu-eee...Lu-eee....Lu-eee"

5. Waking up at 3AM to "amanecer" for el Dia Internacional Contra el SIDA, or International AIDS DAY. I didn't know exactly what we would be doing, but came to find out that it involved a bonfire, ginger juice (???), galletitas, and a prayer at 6AM.

6. Riding in the back of a pickup truck with 15 other jovenes to a town called Las Pajas. You might want to look up that name...

7. Giving my host mom and dad a "pela" as my host brother and I beat them in domino two games in a row....

Hasta el proximo, si Dios quiere...