Some new work

Pravine, Rachel, and I out in Suva

Well, it's been a busy week or so. The trip down to Savusavu last weekend went pretty well. I am going to try and work with a pearl farm down there to start spat collection(collection of pearl bearing oyster youth) in some of the villages up here. It has the possibility to work really well, as there is a large, unfilled market for them at the moment and the waters up here could support the endeavor well. It will be a bit of a delayed gratification type project, as it will probably take a year or so before we can start actualy collecting; but i'm excited none-the-less.

I also started helping to coach a local highschool's track team this week. So far it's going pretty well, and it seems like it will be a nice way to finish my work days up here. It's nice to be working back with runner's again, and I am growing to better appreciate all the work my coach's put in when I was that age, as it's a bit harder than it looks.

We start our rounds of tikina meetings next week, and I am hoping to start getting my environmentally sustainable IGP project information out during these, and hopefully I can begin working with a few villages on the first ones here soon.

There was some bad new this week though. The married Peace Corps couple up here is going to be returning to the states a bit early. The wife has been stuck in the U.S. for almost two months now having some medical tests done, and Peace Corps has decided it would be best for her to stay there indefinetly to continue the tests (nothing serious thankfully). So, the husband will be leaving here most likely next week. This is a bit disappointing as we have now dwindled to two volunteers here in Labasa from the original 5 that were here in August.

Otherwise, everything is going well. I am thinking of heading back down to Savusavu for the weekend to see a few people and have a little good-bye weekend for Bill. Hope all is well.