fish on the barbie...

B- Hello and welcome to the latest update. This weekend could not come soon enough! We are headed to New Orleans tomorrow for a fun-packed three days. Tomorrow night, we are lucky enough to be hosting several RPCV's at my sister's house in New Orleans for some barbequed tuna and PC discussions. (RPCV=returned Peace Corps volunteers). Our good friend at Tulane, C, who was a PCV in Ecuador, has arranged for her friends to come over. A lot of the students in her Masters program were themselves in the PC and one of them is indeed our recruiter, who served in South Africa. We hope she comes. We can't wait. We're very lucky! I know we'll get some good advice.

Then on Saturday we get to go see "Movin' Out" as a bday present to me and then a nice New Orleans dinner, also a bday present to me. Not thinking I was deserving of all this, I told my sister we'd pay for it. However, she said, "This birthday celebration has to last for over 2 years," so with that I said, "Ok, you pay!" Thanks, sis!

Sunday, we'll head home and go to church and get ready for my LAST and Travis' second to last week of VISTA. AmeriCorps has been good to me, but I'm not sad to see it go.

We received this morning another email from the PCV in East Timor who has been advising us. Some items he mentioned for us to bring are duct tape, epoxy glue (strong!), and copper wire (used dually for clothesline and radio antenna), along with laptop and music. The latter items have been a subject for discussion for Travis and me lately. The laptop is a definite no, but we've been debating on the music. Travis put it nicely when he said:

"On one side we say, 'These things will make us comfortable, make us feel at home.' On the other side we say, 'These things will just make more trouble - carrying them, maintaining them, powering them,' and, 'Aren't we trying to get away from these things?' But these are our own questions we need to answer for ourselves."

Well, I try not to be too long-winded, so I'll close it up for now. Thanks to all of our fans and faithful readers! (That's you, Mom!)

And happy birthday to my niece!!! You're beautiful!