¡¡Recycling center and many bug bites later!

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Oh! It´s been 10 days since I´ve left Chicago.
Village visited:
Palmira
Nashira -(eco-village started by 48 women).
Candeleria

Project:
It was amazing to visit Nashira, a village that was started by a group of women who wanted a sustainable eco-community that has a lot going for itself. So, our goal in visiting Nashira was to ask the community what they needed most, and they came to the conclusion that they wanted a recycling center; the communities here will pay the people for bringing in recyclables and they can make a decent amount. However, the center needed to be big enough that it would be worth it for a truck from the near larger city to come and collect the recyclables. So, there it is! Some pictures of us building the recycling center, it was finished in about 3-4 days! Well, okay, so it´s still a little incomplete because it actually took about 3 days to get started. If anyone is familiar with community development and ´island time´ that was what it was; Nashira took a little while to get serious about kick-starting the project but when we got to working, the community came out to help. So, we do have our final picture, and I will post that one as soon as I can get ahold of it from my trip leader as well!

Personal travels and thoughts:
So, we left this morning from the Nashira village and headed for Cali--which is where I am at now =). Cali is known to be ´the´place for Salsa dancing! Cali is also one of the more dangerous places we´ll be at while in Colombia- we´ve had lots of strangers cautioning us to be careful. Ah, it was fun but I couldn´t last longer than 3 hours...My confession, I missed the internet more than caring to dance the Salsa! So I came back early (by 1am) and am now writing this blog and updating pictures! I´ll be here for 2 nights and then will head towards Popayan for about 3 days, and then onwards towards another eco-village called El Prado. In El Prado, there we will be working on another project!

Bugs!!--they bit the heck out of my team members while I wore all pants and long sleeves, but it got way too hot and with my tank top on..my arms and forearms got attacked. I missed the application of bug spray on the underside of my arms and those damn suckers were merciless.

You know, it´s been quite fascinating to be lost and wandering around a city that is unfamiliar to you. The rhythm of the city, and villages all the while learning to speak in a new tongue. I should´ve brushed on my spanish a bit better!

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Photos

Nashira-Angel
She´s pretty much the leader of our Nashira community

Noni Trees
It´s wonderful how much hard work and effort is put in by these people to plant their Noni trees, Orange trees, banana trees, avocado trees, and various plants and gardens around the village.

Quails
They have quails! Which is at the count of 500 at this time, but their goal is to increase it to 5000 to help pay for cost and make some revenue for the families.

Fresh eggs
Fresh eggs for breakfast!

Cooking an egg
They also have a kitchen that uses solar light to cook--however it seems everytime we look under the lid to see what they are cooking, it was an egg!

Butterfly garden
Oh, what a successful butterfly garden! During the daytime, butterflies flew around and around, it was beautiful how the butterflies comes back and stays around without a cage.

Working hard
Recycle!

Recyle!
working. I´d put more pictures but you´d probably get bored too quick!

Sweet as pie
My host Mom Elsy

It was way hot
Eat ice cream like a madwoman

Flower
Flower in her hair.