Man, feels good to be back Xanga. Thanks for keeping everything in order for me. :)

New job, new country, new car, new life. I feel like God has given me such a great period of rest for the past month or so since I have been home. Although I am so happy to be back, I still have this pit in my stomach of disbelief. I know when I start setting up my new classroom I know it will take a long time to feel like home.

Speaking of my nueve job...they requested that I write a short biography of myself for the website. I feel like this is extremely tricky business. If you write too little then people assume that you are not qualified for your position, but if you write too much you are bragging. I also want to maybe put in a joke or two and some food for thought. Tricky tricky.

Next week I am going to New York with Mary for a friends wedding. I have never been, and I am super pumped about it. I know there will be some galavanting, but we haven't decided where.

It is good to be home. :)

I always promised myself that I would stay true to Xanga, and here I am giving my heart to facebook. I am glad Xanga shows me grace and takes me home again.

With that being said, update time!

This past weekend I went camping with Young Life to Playa Fronton, which at the end of Samana peninsula. It was one of the most crazy experiences that I have had in the DR. I thought I had "roughed" it before, but I was so wrong. There are only two ways to get to this beach. One is by boat, and the other is hiking through a thick jungle with jagged coral for a hour and a half. We got to hike. This place is secluded. No water, no power, no bathrooms, no tents. It was me, a couple leaders and 35 high schoolers sleeping on the sand waking up to the sunrise. Amazing. Here are some pictures that I stole because my camera is broken.....

Exact view from where I slept....

Looking down the beach...

This beach is well known also for the glow in the dark plankton that live here. At night you would see a greenish glow on the horizon from the plankton lighting up. It was incredible.

Okay, on to school stuff. I am in the process of trying to wrap up my time here and leave things ready for the next person who is coming. This has been a daughting task.  I am a "bite off more then I can chew" kinda gal and have started HUGE projects with only a couple more weeks to finish them. I am just hoping that I am able to leave a positive mark on the school and leave things in a better condition then when I came. To sooth the stress of it all, I have my amazing students.....

6 1/2 weeks left. I haven't accepted that it's almost time to leave. I can't even start on how crazy/important/stretching this past two years have been......God amazes me.

Wow...let me tell you about my amazing weekend.

School has been absolutely crazy. Trying to run this special education program has turned into one of the most difficult things I will probably ever have to do.

So..because of this, I decided to treat myself to a night at a all inclusive. I invited my fellow special education teacher and off we went to Puerto Plata. Well..the weekend was amazing, I not only met the most interesting people, but I spoke Spanish, German, and Creole. Oh yeah!

But, by far my favorite part of it was as we were waiting for the bus to take us back to Santiago. We were so exhausted, just ready to be home again, and I looked behind me and noticed these three Dominican guys using sign language. Well, if you know me at all, I got super excited. I elbowed Stacy in her side (Stacy also knows Sign Language) and we turned around and introduced ourselves. Well the guys just flipped out! They couldn't believe two white, non-deaf girls knew ASL. We ended up talking to them the whole bus ride back. They are now new friends.

It was so so cool.

So..it gets better.

Today I went with my 7th graders to a poor barrio just outside Santiago to deliver food. My kids were so nervous because most of them had never seen a barrio, let alone gone into one and met the people that lived there. Well, one of my girls, named Laura, pulled me aside and was talking about how she feels that she should give her necklace to a girl. I asked her why her necklace and she said that she didn't know, but it had to be her necklace.  Well, we broke away from the group and she went up to this girl, who was around her age, and gave her the necklace. The girl softly thanked Laura and started to tear up. WELL, the pastor of the church were we stored all the food saw what happened and came up to Laura and told her that the girl who she gave her necklace to was a prostitute and lost her parents a couple years ago. He told her (as he was crying) that she is shunned in the community and that Laura showed her kindness that she hasn't had for awhile.

It was so amazing. Laura just looked at me and bursted out crying.

Sometimes I question so much why I am down here...

But I am so glad that I get these reminders once and awhile.

Coming home in two days. CAN. NOT. WAIT!

I need to stop compulsively buying songs from itunes, especially when I end up buying the wrong song because the 30 second sound clip that itunes gives you is the first verse instead of the chorus. So now I have a whole bunch of songs that all start the same but aren't the song that I have had the melody to stuck in my head now for 3 days. Thank you Mana.

But, I am enjoying Ray LaMontagne's new CD (or new to me). I make mix cds to help me through the seasons that I am missing in the states and Ray makes frequent appearances on pretty much all of them. My fall mix makes me dance (or hobble now) around my apartment while I chop up mango and pretend that the leaves are changing color outside. It has been refreshingly cool the last few days though, I think my genius compilation is convincing the DR to change it's climate just for a short while.

I had parent-teacher conferences yesterday and  my kids always come with their parents. I actually don't mind at all, because everything I tell to the parents I would tell to their kids faces. It makes me wonder though what teachers use to say about me. The funniest thing though was every one of my students told their parents a different story about how I fractured my foot. Some of my favorites are...

- I was getting carried by my guide in 27 waterfalls and he dropped me.

- I dove into a pool off of a waterfall and shattered my foot. (Because, of course, diving is the #1 cause of broken feet)

- I was exploring waterfalls alone, in the jungle, fell, and had to slide my body down the river because I couldn't walk.

Oh kids these days. Love 'em.

Sarah and Mary leave on Sunday.... :(

Well, I use to think that having a parasite was pretty crappy. Well, scratch that, having a cast in the Dominican Republic sucks.

I fractured my foot. So I have a cast. I fell doing 27 waterfalls. I don't know where I came up with the notion that my poise would increase in the two years I will be down here. If anything I have gotten more aware of my awkwardness. I am going to be reminded of that as I fumble around with crutches for two weeks. Hurrah!

Having Sarah and Mary here has been the breath of fresh air that I needed. I forgot just how amazing it is to have visitors. I have great friends and family, that is true.