Week of Holidays

Wow, this past week has been quite busy and full of adventure, with our independence, Comorian independence, Eid (ending of Ramadan festivities), a beach trip, and a walk around in the capital of Comoros (Moroni), it has been nonstop.

So where to begin the week. Beginning from where I left off the weekend was spent just hanging out around the village with other volunteers and also spending some time with me family. When the beginning of the week rolled around it was time for 4th of July, or America's independence. To celebrate the day we went to our Country Director's house and had a massive 4th of July celebration. It was great to have a break from the village and to be able to enjoy some good food with even better company. We ended the celebration with youtube fireworks. Needless to say it was a well spent 4th. The following day was spent with a day full of training. Upon arriving home everyone was in celebration as Eid was confirmed to be celebrated on the 6th, which also happens to be Independence day in Comoros.

When the day of Eid arrived everything was in full swing. The morning began by me going with my family to a family members house, where we celebrated Eid and a Grand Marriage (Wedding), there was lots of dancing it was almost overweleming, especially since I had no clue what was occurring. After sometime there I procceeded to visit a volunteer, who lived right next door, and enjoyed some time with her. Then I went to visit my neighbor and her sister. While there I ran into a lot of the guy volunteers. As I was not wanting to sit around for the celebration I went to visit with another volunteer, who had the same idea and already went to visit a different volunteer's house. So I ended up going to their house and me and the volunteer hung out some time eating and then we headed out to visit some other volunteers in the village. After we finished our adventures walking around we went back to the house to relax for a little. As orginally I was suppose to go to Moroni to celebrate the independence with a parade I went over to my neighbors, who was going with us, and waited until everyone was ready to go. Since she was not yet ready we decided to go walk around the village some more and visit other volunteers we had not yet seen. Then we returned and headed out to get a taxi to Moroni. Since everyone was wanting to go to the parade, we did not succeed in getting a taxi so I went back to a volunteer's house and hung out with her while she made dinner with her family. In the end her family invited me and some other volunteers to eat with them so we returned home to tell our families and then went back to enjoy the dinner. It was great to just spend a dinner with everyone and relax for sometime. Afterwards I headed home and to bed for the night. Thursday was just a relaxing day as Eid has worn me out quite a bite. I hung out with some volunteers for the day, but all in all did not do anything too special.

Friday brought some more adventures. This time to the north of the Island to visit one of the beaches called Maloudja. It was such a beautiful beach, it did not even seem real. It was also really neat as since it was low tide we could walk out for what seemed like miles. The downside to that was us walking all around coral reefs. Which although super cool to see, a pain to be near as one wrong step and you could land on one, and not only does it hurt it can hurt the life there, so it made for a challenge. After some time exploring the area it was time to head back to the main land to relax a little. Of course right when I came back onto the main land I did not relax but instead took a stroll to some other beaches that were in the area. All of them were just as incredible as the last. When we returned back to the orginal beach I headed to eat some food and just hung out for the rest of the time. When it was time to go we all packed into the buses and headed to the East side of the island to take a little trip around there. We ended up stopping and seeing the salt lake, which was quite different. After about 2 hours of driving we made it back to our village at which point I headed straight off to bed.

The following day brought even more things to do as we headed down to Moroni for the day to learn some basic things that we will be utlizing the next two years. This included shopping at the market, how to withdraw money, how to send out letters, and how to cook with a typical stove. Needless to say it was both very fun while also very tiring, as we walked all of Moroni. At the end we all came back and had ice cream as a form of celebration, which was a great suprise for us. When all was said and done we went back up to our village and after dinner meet up for a Volunteer movie night. Although the rain ruined the night it was still super fun and the view, movies under the stars, was incredible. Today was a much more melow day. Though we did enjoy watching a soccer tournament here in Mvouni, which was quite an experience. All in all things are going well here and the days/weeks seem to be going by quicker each day. This week coming up nothing to crazy is planned, apart from being apart of the Grand Marriage. IIll give more details on that in the next update.

Until Then.