Ok, not much time today so i'll have to make it quick, and hopefully i can make up for it by posting a few pics. From the top: my host family; my host village group and out trainer; my family's house (the greener one), and sunrise out infront of the village. I hope to get a few more up in the next weeks. Been a busy last couple weeks. I spent last weekend visiting another volunteer's site and meandering around Suva. Had some great food, drank a few beers, and generally had a great time. I was able to get out snorkeling for the first time last week, which was nice. I would have expected to be out much more often, living on the water and all, but the reef is a good 3/4 of a mile off shore and we have not have a whole lot of down time as of late. The reef sits at the mouth of a river, and as such is a bit overrun with algae (from nutrient runoff) and is a bit sedimented; but it was still great to finally get out there. Other than that, it has just been a lot of language classes in the mornings, and technical environmental trainings in the afternoons. Our site announcement day is now 5 days away, so hopefully my next post will have all kinds of great information about my futer plans here.

Alright, some have emailed my and such for an address. My temporary one is:

Aric Bickel

Peace Corps Fiji

Private Mail Bag

24 St Fort st

Suva, Fiji Islands

The postal service here is a bit unreliable, so expect 2 -3 weeks for arrival. If sending a box or other not lettered package, i suggest writing "Jesus please watch over this package" in red sharpy marker accompantied by several crosses. Doing this helps ensure that it will not be broken into during transit.

Sorry I havent sent out more personal emails, I have unfortunately not had a lot of time to take care of some of these items; so excuse me if i use this space to send a couple quick messages:

Dave: thanks for the email, all kinds of excited about josh's new album; am eagerly anticipation

Howard: hilarious that you saw playmaker; not surprised you met a girl, i put the word out i was leaving and that you were available, and I can gaurante that kid has nicer sulu legs tha I do.

Jessica: sorry, haven't been able to get a phone call out yet, try to do so soon.

Dov: what was the hebrew term some of you israeli friends used over the wedding weekend for being allowed to break kosher (random, but it came up in conversation out here)?

Mom: I have tried calling you twice in the mornings to only get a busy signal, try keep the lines open between 6-7am for the next few days.

All: Thanks for all the posts, it's great hearing from everyone and is always a nice surprise when i get on here.

Hope all is well bak in the states (or where ever it is you're reading this from) and hopefully I will be able to get back here next week.

cheers,

Aric

Planning for a site visit

To start: The information, views, and opinions listed in this blog are not those of the Peace Corps, and should not be read as such.

Alright, so it seems like for the time being i should be able to make it to internet access on the weekends (that is atleast until I leave for my perminent site in August). It has been an excellent week. Aside from the language classes, we visited a current volunteers site on Tues, Namatakua village (which is situated along the Queens Road in southern Viti Levu). There we went through several technical seminars on building composting toilets, starting village recycling programs, and mitigating piggery wastes in a village setting. Thursday we had a joint session with all of the currently training volunteers in a nearby village (Daku). Following the training seminars the village youth preformed a traditional meke (or dance) for us; which was immedietely followed by a decent amount of kava drinking and dancing (the village had an extremely talented band; i swear every fijin can play an instrument and sing). On Friday we visited an adjacent village to mine (Monera[sp?]) for a mangrove seminar in preparation for a workshop on monday on reforesting harvested mangrove areas. This morning (our saturday), they dropped (in small groups) in Suva where we were given 14 or so destination and objectives that we had to acheive on our own. It was relatively interesting using the language to find out bus fares and stops and other necessary information to complete the assigned tasks. The final destination was a pizza place here, where peace corps purchased lunch. It was the first bit of dairy/american food I've had since leaving; and I'd have to say it was glorious.
As Mary alluded, several of the men in the gourp, including myself, have entered into a facial hair growing contest in preparation for our site assignment day (July 4th). Little did they know they were going up against a ringer, and I fully expect to look zz-topish by then. Otherwise, things are still going very well. Next week i will be traveling to nausori to spend the weekend at a current volunteers site; the idea being to get an idea of what it will be like at our own site. Between this, and the mangrove planting on monday it should be a good week, and I should have a bit more two write about next weekend.
My apologies, I have been having difficulty accessing my email accounts on this computer, so if i don't get back to you this week don't take it personally.... I will surely respond as soon as i can.

cheers,

Aric

p.s. Jessica i got your card on thurs, thank you.

First few weeks

Alright, so I have finally been able to make it to a computer that allows me access the the blog site here. It feels like a lot of time has passed since I left, so it's hard to know where to start. Everything is going very well. Upon arrival in Fiji, we spent 3 days in Nadavi, which is just a bit North of Suva (the capital city); these days consisted mainly of general orienatation and some intitial language training. On the Saturday after arriving, we were sent of to our host villages in small groups. There are 30 of us in my training group split between 6 villages; about half are environmental volunteers, the opther half are health volunteers. As it currently stands, there are five of us in my village; Kiova, which is a small coastal village of about 200 people about an hour and a half from Suva. I have been placed with a fitting host family; my host father is a diver and fisherman who has four sons around my age. Staying in the village has been lovely; the sense of community within the village is inspiring and the people have been overly welcoming and generous. The Peace Corps has been keeping us pretty busy with language training and technical seminars, but in my free time I have been able to run just about every day and fit in a few games of touch rugby (rugby is huige here). I'm still unsure as to where I will be placed after the three months of trains; currently we are scheduled to to find out on July 4th, and as you can imagine I am eagerly anticipating that day. Unfortunately my internet time is a bit limited, so cannot as yet go in to much detail; but suffice to say that I am have a wonderful time, the people are great, and I am highly looking forward to getting out there and working. I will write again as soon as possible, and I will try to get some pictures up soon.

Cheers.

p.s. For those who have inquired, I have made my first sulu purchase (a sulu is the professional garment worn by men in Fiji that resembles a skirt), and i will certainly get some picture of me rocking the sulu as soon as possible.