The End of February

Again, my apologies for the length of time between my entries. I definitely have a lot to write about now, AND I have some time at work (which has become a rarity).

I made it through President's week with no high school kids around and have mostly gotten back into the groove of having my Peer Education class. I like the kids in it--there are only 4 on a good day, so it's easy to manage, and they're mostly good kids. I've enjoyed teaching them, and enjoyed learning how to teach. It's a weird class because I'm sitting down with them, so it doesn't feel as much like a class. But we've made it work.

Otherwise in work, we've been planning for this health fair to celebrate National Women & Girls' HIV/AIDS Awareness Day, which FINALLY is this week. We had the first fair on Friday, which went really well despite what appeared to be a huge amount of disorganization. But I was a little stressed about that last week. We had a poster contest for the event that was more or less a huge bust; we got no posters from one of the five schools. But it is fine--we got a lot from another school and it all worked out.

I also have landed teaching a puberty/pregnancy prevention class at one of our middle schools (MS 54) and in another health class in a middle school (MS 260). I taught my first class at MS54 last week, and I was SO nervous, but it went well, despite my running out of time. I felt like a real teacher, too! Very cool. And the kids had so many questions--I'm really excited about teaching them and offering them a perspective of someone who is willing to talk about this stuff. They are a Delta class, which is an honors program at the school, so they're a little bit of a different demographic than we're exactly trying to reach out to, but whatever.

That's pretty much work life. I'm excited that things are getting busier, but I am also sort of nervous about that. AND, I'm officially 6 months into my service, which is crazy. But true.

I've also had several people come visit. My friend Adam (from Appalachian days) was here last weekend, which was nice. We went to the American Museum of Natural History and saw several of their shows, which were awesome, and we also went to the Climate Change and Butterlies special exhibits. We also took the Staten Island Ferry...accidentally at night...so we could see the Statue of Liberty. The view was really beautiful of the city at night...the Statue of Liberty not that exciting. The other big thing we did was go to the 9/11 site and take a tour with people who had helped with the cleanup/been directly affected by the attack. It was a lot more interesting than I was expecting, and I felt like I learned quite a bit, partly because I tried to pay little attention to everything when it happened because I was so turned off by our lovely President's response. We also went to Century 21, which is right by the 9/11 site, and seriously the most awesome department store I've ever been to. Sweet! It was a good time overall.

Then Daniel (friend from Germany who studied abroad at UNC) arrived literally the same day Adam left...He has been here a week now and is leaving (sadly :-() tomorrow. I've been going to work and meeting him wherever he is when I get off. We watched the VA Tech v UNC game on Wednesday, but mostly just walked around. Saturday, we trekked around Central Park, as it was BEAUTIFUL outside. We went to a comedy show Saturday night, as well as a nice dinner at Le Monde (the restaurant my former roommate worked at). It's provided me a wonderful excuse to get out and do stuff, but also, we've had some nice weather, which makes me realize how excited I am for it to get nice here. I'm really looking forward to wanting to get out and do stuff, even just by myself.

On top of all that, another friend got stuck in NY, and I'm going to dinner with him tonight. AND Ali, along with two of her friends, is coming this weekend. Needless to say, I'm getting plenty of social time. When it rains, it pours, no? It's been nice having people I love come visit...and I look forward to more of that!

I've also been thinking more about what I want to do next year. I'm still sort of hoping I'll be able to find a decent job here (and I perhaps have some leads...), but I am still trying to figure out how I'm going to fit 1) traveling around South America and 2) going to nursing school (perhaps at UNC....) into the next 8 years of my life. As for now, I'm trying to focus on the moment, and just enjoy my job being something interesting and having so many people come visit, as well as living in such a fabulous place.

Check back--I'm planning on posting some fun stories from my puberty classes...I know there will be :-).

Much love!
Shannon