Busy Busy Busy

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Well thank goodness that my blogs were saved. I was receiving calls and messages from the Smithsonian - they had been planning to archive my blog entries as an American Treasure, when the blogs were potentially lost, they put their web bloodhounds to work and helped me find each and every one. Usually they reserve Presidential Libraries for former President’s, however, there has been some talk in Congress about an appropriation’s bill for constructing the Jeremy King Library. I am a little humbled by this, but even more concerned. I don’t think I have enough material to fill the library. I have my Ecuador blogs, a travel journal from Australia, a box of love notes from my middle school days, most of my papers from Denison and Ohio State Universities, a few letters of correspondence between Susan and I from when I did a summer of research in Michigan, some song lyrics from my CHHF - Gruver days, and about 500 odd science tests, quizzes, and worksheets that I generated in my teaching days. All told, I believe that my library could fit into two or three medium-sized Rubbermaid storage bins. At least my library will have more important and interesting information that the proposed George W. Bush Presidential Library. Once again, your tax dollars will be well spent preserving an important piece of American heritage.

On to this week: after spending 1.5 days fixing my blog (Technology 1 - Jeremy 0) and not doing much office work, I finally sat down to get some stuff done. My first order of business was to take Katie’s flash drive and download the latest edition of our paper into the computer at the office. Somehow, I proceeded to fry her flash memory - she took it amazingly well - losing 1.5 years of data in the span of about 0.5 seconds. Computer Technology 2 - Jeremy 0. We then decided to give technology a rest and went to scout out the school where we plan to have our summer science camp. We chose Amauta Ñampi, the indigenous school to be the site. Katie got to work making flyers for the camp and we hammered out a schedule of activities. Katie then went to work back at her office, trying to salvage her flash memory (it didn’t work) and re-making the page for the newspaper. She informed me that she was going to be gone over the next week and that meant I was in charge of making the next kid’s page all by myself.

Wow, what a challenging thing to do. I spent most of Wednesday fighting my computer and the fact that I had no clipart - Technology 3 - Jeremy 0. Finally, by Thursday, I figured out how to get the images I wanted and how to position them on the page. Things were improving and the page was taking shape Technology 3 - Jeremy 1 - finally I scored - Ecuador has been kicking my ass - I’ve been feeling a little like the Buckeyes in the National title game.

Mary, from Global Pediatric Alliance, has been in town this week having meetings with Andrea and I in the office. CODEAMA has a grant through GPA for the FRATES communities. I like Mary, she is level headed, intelligent, keen, and has the right outlook on development work. For this particular grant, I will be going out to the FRATES communities with Fannie (Guillermo’s daughter and a nurse) to work on health programming. One of my tasks will be to teach a little sex education to the boys and young men. Mainly, however, my role will be to assist Fannie and to learn more about the communities and their needs so that I can guide my Peace Corps work in the best direction to help these communities.

Susan and I had lunch with Mary on Thursday - Sue finally got to meet her and they discussed the Waorani at length. Susan may try to apply for a health grant through GPA for the Waorani. This has the potential of being a great project for them.

Later that day, Mary, Andrea, and I went to the community center in Puyo to see a traveling display on Yasuni National Park. The display was essentially a traveling campaign to try and get 1,000,000 signatures nationwide to protect and preserve Yasuni. Yasuni is basically Waorani territory and it is oil rich - the two don’t mix really well. Sadly, the display was fantastic with tons of awesome pictures of the park, its wildlife, and the Waorani, but the organizers apparently failed to invite the Waorani to come. This is ironic, since in Puyo is where the Waorani political body calls home - maybe they were invited and didn’t come - in which case it is equally as sad. Anyhow, I signed the petition and spent $5 on a Viva Yasuni t-shirt.

Late Thursday afternoon we fielded a call via SKYPE from our friends Rick and Melinda. Sue and I chatted with them for nearly an hour - totally free through the internet - Technology 3 - Jeremy 2 (Sue with the assist). This SKYPE thing is really cool - the connection is almost always better than a phone connection. If any of you want to chat, just e-mail one of us to set up a time and we’ll make it happen.

Friday, was a National Holiday (10 de Agosto), Ecuador’s Independence Day, or at least one of them, they have a few I think. My office was officially closed, however, I asked Bolivar if I could come in to work - I had a lot to get done. He let me in and I worked a half day yesterday. The week was long and stressful so I came home and tried to take a nap - that never seems to work with me. I was so tired and worn out that I was feeling sick. I recovered enough though in the late afternoon to walk with Susan and Tigre (Katie’s dog that we are watching again) to our favorite Friday hang-out bar. We had some beers and some papas fritas. We returned home and Katie came over to get Tigre and we drank some more beers and chatted. Then we went to bed. That’s the news from Puyo.

Jeremy

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Comments

[Greg]

A fun link
Jeremy, here is a little YouTube link for your enjoyment. I hope you have not seen it before. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lTiFKnLifCU