September Wrap-Up

Sorry I haven't written in so long! September was a ridiculously busy month. I was all over the place. First, I took a quick trip to the U.S. for my cousin Leah's wedding! It was in California, so it wasn't technically a trip home, but I was so happy to see so many members of my family and to see Leah marry a guy who is as awesome as her. It was weird being back in the U.S., but since I was only there for three days I didn't really have time to go through reverse culture shock. (Though a trip to the grocery store was amazing and overwhelming.) Coming back to Panama was hard, especially leaving the hot showers behind, but it was nice to get back to my community and realize that everyone had missed me and that my Spanish hadn't deteriorated at all. In fact, on the plane home, I thought, "Why are they telling us all this safety stuff twice?" before I realized that once was in Spanish and once was in English.

I was only back in site for a few days before I had to leave again for my group's second IST (In-Service Training). You may remember we had our first one in early June. This one was longer - five days of training classes from 8am to 6pm. It was exhausting but I learned a lot and it was nice to see everyone in my group again.

IST ended on a Friday and that same day I went to the office in Panama City to participate in the Diversity Panel for the new group of trainees. During training every group has a session about diversity which consists of a couple current volunteers talking about their various “diversity factors” and what it's like to be a black/Hispanic/gay/ etc. volunteer in Panama. In my case, I talked about being Jewish, which has been difficult at times. Panama is mostly Catholic and Evangelical and the people in my community don't really know anything about Judaism. (Except that it has something to do with killing Jesus.) I also talked about being a woman here which can be really frustrating in this machismo culture! But that's a topic to write about another day. I liked meeting a new group of trainees and making them aware of some of the things they'll be facing when they get to their sites. It also made me realize how long I've been here and how far I've come since I was a trainee like them!

Since I was in the city already, a bunch of my friends and I spent the weekend there. I love Panama City and explore more and more of it every time I'm there.

After that, I was only back in site for a few more days before I left again for Regional Meeting. Every four months, all the volunteers in each region have a meeting. (My first one was in May.) Since there aren't many volunteers in my region, Panama Oeste, they group us with the region next to us, Cocle. I like Regional Meetings because we get to catch up on all the Peace Corps news and interact with volunteers from other sectors. There are about 40 volunteers in the Cocle/Panama Oeste region. (Approximately 200 in Panama in total.) The best part about Regional Meeting is that we all go to the beach afterwards and spend the night.

Group 67 Teach English Cocle/Panama Oeste family, Brady Bunch style

Finally, after Regional Meeting, it was the end of September and I was back in site for good. It has been nice to get back into my routine and catch up with everybody. I bought GRE study guides in the U.S. so I've been studying a lot and I'm planning to take the GRE when I'm home in December. I took a diagnostic test before I started studying and I only got two wrong on the verbal section... and only two RIGHT on the math section. As my mother said, “At least you know your strengths, honey.” I have a lot of math studying to do before December!

We've had lots of holidays and celebrations in October, with even more to come in November, so I'll write about all of those next time!