Life at one month in

We got beds, mattresses, a phone, kitchen dishes, etc before students arrived!  It was a rush to the start.

And then Orientation week happened.  Orientation week is always busy because it is the time when the students are busy traveling around the area in order to learn about Belize, and what the CCSP community is all about.  I didn’t go on too many of the outings, as I was actually starting to do my job!  Since moving and unpacking took priority, I didn’t get a chance to start many necessary parts of the job until students left for travel weekend. 

My first weeks of being the Program Administrator have been a challenge, but I’m slowly getting to the place where I have more of a rhythm and order to my daily job (that being said within CCSP’s highly structured but highly variable schedule).  I’ve set office hours (and already broke them…) so that’s a start on the work/life balance front. Three weeks after the students arrived, and I know that I at least have my head on, even if it’s not totally straight... 

Our student group is fairly diverse in personality and interests, yet accepting of each other. A highlight of the semester has been seeing how the students are getting involved in the community already.  I’m excited about my small group, and although I’m not involved with many field trips or classes this semester, I feel that I will be able to invest more in getting to know the students because I won’t be around the students every moment of the day. 

And another exciting part of the semester has been getting to know the two new staff! Josh and Gellie have weathered the crazy beginning well.  Life at CCSP is almost completely different for me with the new job, new campus and new staff team.  But through all of the changes, God is providing.  Most of all, he is providing a new, much needed community.

Check out CCSP Belize's blog  http://www.ccspbelizef11.blogspot.com/  for some pictures of our new campus and the student's adventures so far!

I would love to hear from you!

love,

Joelle

An email/blog written in the first 3 days... which was August 17... three weeks ago.

Hey I'm here!

Sorry it took 3 days to let you know, but I figured you would know that I'm alive...
CCSP is moved!  Josh and I were delayed getting into Belize by and hour and a half, so we got to the Nab (old campus) on Sunday night, had supper and went to bed after discussing the game plan for Monday which was moving day!  We had a team of 5 Belizeans plus the 5 of us CCSP staff to load up the entirety of CCSP’s earthly goods.  We had most things (we thought)  packed into the 2 prados, the van, and our bus by, minus all of our office desks, which didn’t fit in any vehicles.  Then we drove over (20 minutes) and piled all our stuff on the covered verandas that surround the buildings.

Monday night was our last night at the Nab. And I was sad leaving Nabitunich.  I know I'll be back to visit, but we are also leaving Succotz and all the people in the
village there that we have relationships with.  

The new campus is an answer to prayer for the program, and we are all trying to remember this fact in the crazy business of moving and having to get the program running in 10 days before students arrive.  Amid the intensity of the move, our staff team is trying to find time to get to know each other as we have two new staff members in our group of 5! It has been fun to get to know a bit about Josh and Gellie although it has only been a couple.

CCSP has moved, but we have not unpacked, nor do we have beds, mattresses, classroom tables, bookshelves for our 53 boxes of library books, dishes for the kitchen, or a working phone! 

However, we do have an amazing orchard with avocados that are bearing fruit right now, 17 acres of tropical forest along the river with trails, and beautiful buildings.

Hope you are all doing well.  It’s hot and humid here.

Love,

Joelle

Whidby!

Well, I made it to the island!  I've been here since Sunday, after a couple days in the Seattle area. It's freezing here!  The first couple of days of work here at Pacific Rim, the temperature was in the 40's, with the afternoon in the 50's.  The last couple days have been a bit warmer, afternoons getting into the mid-60's with a little bit of sun to warm me up! 

Pacific Rim Institute is where I'm living and working, which used to be Au Sable Institute's Pacific Rim campus.  I'm helping out with general maintenance of the grounds, as well as prairie restoration work, managing the garden, and helping with some research data collection.  I'm loving the variety of work, especially the opportunity to learn some native plants and birds of the ecosystems of the Pacific NW.  I also love that I can eat fresh lettuce and spinach from the garden! While I'm not directly involved in research, I do help collect data for some ongoing projects. This morning I learned about trapping voles and mice! Two other interns and I learned how to collect the necessary data from each animal that was trapped; especially how to hold the voles so that they don't bite you or escape while taking the data! The small mammal trapping is used to figure out the population size and distribution of these animals on the prairie, especially the voles, which eat grasses and other plants.

I'm blessed to be sharing an apartment with Holly, a friend from a summer at Au Sable Michigan where we both took classes.  It's fun to be cooking together, and trying new recipes.

Now that I've been in the states for almost a month, I'm mostly adjusted to life here again.  The update from life before Whidby is that I'm Wilderness First Responder Certified! And my stuff at home is mostly packed into boxes, except for some clothes in the closet, meaning that "my room" is not really mine anymore. 

 Looking forward to the rest of the summer, I have decided to give this blog a rest until I get back to Belize.  After all, blogs are horribly one sided, and I now have the opportunity to communicate cheaply by phone!  Of course I still have email, but I really want to used this summer to have phone conversations and catch up with you all.  Email me if you want my phone number and we can set up a time to talk!

Joelle

the end is coming

The end of the semester is almost here. It's a mix of emotions.  The students are flying out on Friday, and this week we have 3 days of debriefing to do before they leave!  Tomorrow is a free day for them to do all of those 'one last time' things. 

Integration week was this past week, and it was a huge blessing to be a part of class and to hear the students engaging with everything that they have been learning this semester! I am so encouraged and excited by how much the students have been challenged and have grown throughout the semester! Because I see the students' growth, I am ready for them to go home and share with family and friends, and be challenged again- this time by North American culture. 

But realizing that we only have 4 days left together is hard.  Staff have 10 days of work after students leave, which is another sad realization for me because I will be saying goodbye to 3 close coworkers/friends who won't be returning in the fall! 

I am also going through a transition, as I am changing roles here at CCSP Belize.  I'm taking on the Program Administrator position, as Kelly is leaving CCSP at the end of this semester.  The decision to take the PA job was actually a really big deal.  My role as SLC was only a year 'internship', a temporary job which would have brought me back to the States to start the next phase of life in December.  But the PA job will put me on the 'long term' staff list, probably with a 2 year contract.  I know that doesn't seem very long term, but it is a huge change in perspective for me. Belize will be home now, instead of me just working temporarily in Belize.  Also, the two weeks that I'll be in Sioux Center in May will be the only two weeks I'll be home for the whole next year. 

Since taking the job two weeks ago, my summer plans have changed a bit.  Instead of traveling Costa Rica for 10 days like I had planned, I'll fly straight home on the 16th of May, be home for one day and then drive the next day to Madison, WI for a 7 day, 70 hr Wilderness First Responder course.  Part of my new job will be to eventually become the Health and Safety officer, so I need this training. Then I drive home on the 26th, and spend 2 weeks in Sioux Center.  After that I will be going to a conference with the other CCSP long term staff for 5 days, and then hopefully flying to Washington on June 11 or 12 to start my summer with Pacific Rim Institute! 

So.... if any of you are in Iowa, I would love to see you between May 27 and June 5!  or you could always come to visit me in Belize sometime in the next 2 years :)

I hope I can talk to some of you this summer!

Marine- a week experiencing the Caribbean

Hi friends and family!  I’m now back to the real world after a week on a tiny island way off the coast of Belize.  There the students studied the ecology of coral reefs, sea grass and mangrove communities which together support all of the life of the oceans!  I was supposed to be a supporting TA, which meant that I helped out with packing all of our supplies for the class/lab and breakfast, and keeping stuff organized.  I also drove the three hours it takes to get to Sittee River in the vehicle with all our stuff. From there we took a boat out to Glover's Atoll.

I’ve been growing so much this semester that it is hard to write about it and tell you what has been going through my mind.  One recent area of growth is that I've became comfortable with my role as an encourager.  I’ve been realizing that I should be encouraging the students more this semester, but am not naturally an encourager. I have been of the opinion that I would just try to model my excitement and positive outlook on life, so that the students would follow.  And modeling is certainly necessary in this role, but during Marine, I realized that words are necessary too. 

A couple of the students were anxious about snorkeling and being in the ocean and I felt comfortable enough in our relationship to encourage them and pray with them during some tough times.  It was a week of growth for me in those experiences, and also a relaxing week for me to be de-stress after being “on”  all of the week before.  And the uniqueness of marine life always causes me to be in awe of God- another reason why last week was a great week. 

We traveled back from Glover’s all day Saturday.  Three hour boat ride including snorkeling the mangroves, late lunch, three hour drive back to the Nab.  So we all were pretty tired.  But Sunday was Easter!  We had planned to do an Easter Sunrise service on Sunday morning, so Ashley and I put a service together after supper, and then I spent the rest of the night practicing Easter songs. 

Easter Sunday was another long day for me, but one that I received a lot of joy from.  The Sunrise service at 6 went well, and then there was time for breakfast before church.  I arrived at St Andrews and was asked to read in church, as I went to a special Friday night service during lent and met a good number of the women in the church who organize everything. Typical two hour service, then we headed back to the Nab where Ashley and I started cooking up the Easter feast! 

The Easter feast was a big deal, as Ashley and I had been dreaming up the menu for quite sometime!  We don’t have the traditional ‘Sunday dinner’ here in Belize and we were both craving the food and traditions of home. Cooking up a storm all afternoon, with some students’ help, we made supper for 16!  It was a fun day and we were all stuffed and satisfied with turkey, mashed potatoes and gravy, roasted root vegetables, sautéed broccoli and beans in balsamic vinegar, homemade baked beans, fresh whole wheat rolls, salad with toasted/caramelized almonds, pineapple cobbler, banana and coconut cream pies, and homemade ice cream!  It was quite the experience, especially the work that went into getting some of the ingredients!

Hope that all your Easter celebrations were joyful.
Love,
Joelle

internship weeks and summer plans

Three weeks ago, internships began for the students. We dropped off students at their homestays and internship sites, gave instructions on how to get to and from their home and work places and left them to experience the next week on their own!  The students all came back to the Nab during the weekend, so the first week I stayed at the Nab and finished up odds and ends for work.  It was great to spend time with Derek and Ashley (the directors) who were also around the whole week, and the other staff who were in and out throughout the week. I went on a cooking frenzy with Ashley, and tons of time cooking and baking for breakfast, lunch and supper to satisfy some of our food cravings for favorite recipes from home that we don't eat here. The first week of internships also brought temperatures of over 100 degrees F.  Afternoons became too hot to do anything but go to the river and sit in the cool water and talk, so that's what Ashley and I did.

The students all came back on the weekend, and it was great to hear all of their stories and hang out with them in a relaxed way, because I wasn't planning too many activities!
On Monday morning of the next week I left early in the morning to catch a bus and headed down south to a Mayan village near Punta Gorda. After I finally arrived in the village I asked around to find the village leader and walked to his house.  Jorge was the man who brings people upriver in his traditionally made dugout canoe.  Then I enjoyed an amazing dory ride upriver during the early evening. I visited and relaxed at a Maya Mountain Research Farm, which is a permaculture farm that is 30 minutes upriver from the village via dory, or a 45 minute hike.  Permaculture is a method of sustainable agriculture which is based off of ecological principles.  So a permaculture farm in Belize seeks to model a forest system, while producing food and products for human use. The benefit of this model is that it is a stable system, as natural systems stabilize and add to the soil instead of degrading and eroding the soil. 

During the week I read up on permaculture, helped the other interns who were studying at the farm cook over the wood fire, and got to know the stories of the other interns.  It was great to be in a different community of people my age, as we swam at the river and had all sorts of discussions with them about their ideas about environmental issues and solutions and what their hopes and dreams.  I was also in love with the area, being very remote and surrounded by forest.  I drank pure spring water the whole week and also drank in the beauty of the trees, birds and the river. Coming back to the Nab on Friday, I felt the most relaxed that I have all semester, which was great because I jumped right back into work with community events, and TAing.  Last week I was the TA for a pretty intense class, Sustainable Community Development 2.  We had three days of fieldtrips, and so everyone was worn out at the end of this week! 

The great thing about this week was that our professor was Robert Pelant, who runs Pacific Rim Institute, where I will be volunteering this summer!  So I got to talk with him more about where I'll be living, what I'll be doing, etc.

Pacific Rim is on Whidby Island in Washington, and used to be AuSable Pacific Rim.  I will be primarily helping out with their restoration projects, which includes prairie restoration. I will also be helping out with some of their on going research projects and collecting data.  The first half of the summer I'll be working full time with the restoration and research, and the second half of the summer I will (in the process of registering for) be auditing an Au Sable class while also working.  I hope to take Alpine Ecology, and it will be awesome to study this ecosystem through a field biology course! I will be on Whidby Island from the second week in June through the middle of August.  At this point, I plan to fly home from on May 27, and then probably leave for Washington on June 6 or 7. 


So those are my summer plans!  I hope to see some of you this summer!
Love,
Joelle

ps- have a blessed Semana Santa. I was really blessed by a Palm Sunday service at the local Catholic church.  The Benque church has both a Spanish and and English service but because of the holiday the service this week was only in Spanish.  Somehow I managed to understand most of the sermon and was blessed by the service which included singing with marimba and guitar music.

since spring break...?

I know that it is far too long, again!  I’ve been busy… I said I would write about spring break, however, that was 4 weeks ago already!  I have some amazing stories of my Guatemala travels, but most of them will have to wait. 

The overview of my break was that I traveled with Nick, another CCSP staff person, first to the black sand beaches on the Pacific coast which were created by volcanoes!  While there, I generally tried to have a true break from work, by doing a bunch of lounging (reading, relaxing, journaling) in a hammock on the shaded deck of the hotel, right on the beach (2 steps and I was on sand).  After a couple of days, Nick and I decided that we wanted to see the Quetzal, and would try to fit in the trip despite limited travel time. So we had a long day of busing across Guatemala to get to the cloud forests. Cloud forests are tropical forests that are high enough in the mountains that they are covered in clouds and fog for most of the day.  I have fallen in love with the beauty of the cloud forest; as a distinct community they have a different feel than any other forest I’ve been to.  We spent one night in this cool mountainous area, and the next morning went hunting for the (reportedly) beautiful but elusive bird. Spent another day traveling back to Nabitunich (more crazy stories), so that we could be back one whole day before the students got back from their spring break travels! 

Forest Ecology was a really good week!  Unfortunately I came back from spring break sick, so I couldn’t do all of the class hikes, and spent a lot of time sleeping, but I was able to spend a day hiking with other staff while the students did research projects. We did a ton of birding, as our professor, David Foster, is has an amazing eye for birds!  Birds are a really important indicator for the health of the forest, so I’m glad that I’m expanding my knowledge to include birds as well as plants.  If you want to read more about the class you can check out www.belizejournals11.blogspot.com

Two week ago we finished up God and Nature 2 with Rolf Bouma.  The class mostly dealt with environmental ethics, and our ethical responsibility as Christians for the earth.  It was a great class, even though I couldn’t attend many classes due to the urgent work I needed to do with organizing the next  class that I will be TAing, which is Sustainable Community Development 2 this coming week!  So two weeks ago I was busy setting up fieldtrips and getting our schedule figured out for the class, which takes a lot of phone calls and emails! 

Sustainable Community Development 2 involves a two day field trip… including an overnight with host families in a rural Mayan village up north, close to the Mexican border. Thankfully, the professor is someone I also had my semester, although he didn’t teach SCD 2 last time, so this will be a new class for him.

In between the crazy work week of God and Nature and this coming week, we had 2 weeks of Internships! This meant that students spent their weekdays off campus, with a Belizean organization doing all different activities related to their diverse interests, all over Belize!  Students also had a homestay during the weekdays, but most of them came home on the weekend in between to check in and relax.

I’ll write more about what I did during these 2 weeks soon, but this is already a long enough blog! Hope you are all doing well.  I would love to hear from you!

daily life?

So, some of you have been asking what I do most days.  Talking to Mom and Dad a couple weeks ago, I realized that they didn’t know about all of the activities that are part of CCSP’s routine. So here is an explanation of my daily life (that being said, we travel a lot, so schedules are often broken)

Monday, the beginning of the class week, starts at 8:00 with Morning prayer on the Veranda, just like every other weekday.  Then breakfast!  On weeks that I am the responsible TA, the precious time from 8:40 to 9 is spent setting up the classroom, getting any electronics set up, handouts printed, etc.  Nine to 12 is morning class, and attendance is part of my job description.

So far, we’ve had 3 professors that were new to me this semester, although most of them had taught with CCSP before.  I’ve really enjoyed hearing the different perspectives of the professors, learning about their lives, getting to know them and everything they bring to the CCSP community for a week. I’ve also been able to experience one class (God and Nature 1) a second time, with a professor that I had as a student.   I was also the TA for God and Nature, and it was great to be able to reconnect with Sylvia and also get a refresher on the overarching themes of Biblical story.

Twelve thirty lunch is next on the schedule, and after lunch the hot afternoon is free from the classroom. Students scatter around campus in search of the coolest spots to read and do homework, or they head off to a close by restaurant for a cool drink and some internet. The staff have meetings twice a week in the afternoons, once for prayer and once for 'business'.  I also have individual meetings once every two weeks with the director, Derek. 

Afternoons fill up with activities fast.  First, there’s almost always one field trip (day trip) each week to fill the day with activity, or there might be an afternoon outing in order to find a relaxing place to read and to cool off at the river.  There is always organizational work for the TA, taking notes on the class, compiling receipts, and writing blogs for CCSP.  On weeks I don’t TA, there are afternoons of grocery shopping, meeting future host families of students, and planning for all our community events!

Which brings me to the weekly rhythms of CCSP: Mondays before supper we have Music and Musings, where students share music for musing and discussion.  Tuesday mornings at 7:15 we have small group devotions. Wednesday is Noontime News and Book Reviews.  Nick (the other SLC) and I gather the news from home, including current weather and school sports reports.  Staff keeps up on world news to share. We also try to read the Belizean newspapers and encourage the students to do the same so we can all inform each other about current events and issues in Belize. Thursday mornings bring Read-out-Loud time during breakfast.  Currently, we are reading Shane Claiborne’s The Irresistible Revolution. Friday is a big day of planning, as we always have Celebration Night to celebrate the professor of the week who has shared so much with us.  Each week is packed with so much learning, that we relax and celebrate the week after all the final tests, papers, and projects are completed!  Usually we dream up and have students work on a creative presentation for the professor, or some creative way of showing our thanks for a great week. 

Saturday is an odds and ends day.  Often chores get left for the weekend, our chore groups meet for cleaning, gardening or other tasks around campus.  I often do my laundry; I find relief of stress by using my muscles, sweating in the sun, spraying water over myself while wringing out cloths, and feeling the breeze dry me off while hanging clothes on the line at Derek and Ashley’s house.  They have the best place to do laundry because they live on a hill in the middle of the cow pasture, so they have a beautiful view of the area and it is always breezy to dry the clothes quickly!

Sunday I take Sabbath when I can (meaning that I don’t work until supper time, unless I’m on Kitchen duty which involves meal prep on Sundays). Sunday night is another big night with 7:00 Town Hall meeting, where the TA breaks down the week schedule and give everyone a heads up for travel, fieldtrips, etc. 7:30 we begin Community Night, which is our time of worship. Alternative worship is the way we describe community nights, as we try to expose students to powerful forms of worship from other traditions, often including meditative, liturgical worship.  Some community nights that I have been involved with so far have been a Taize service (meditative style of worship that involves singing and silence), a Communion Service, and a day of prayer and fasting which wrapped up with a Sunday night time of sharing what we learned.

In between all these activities, I hang out with students, and especially enjoy meals which bring the community together and are a leisurely event. We enjoy the social time to relax and talk. 

So that is a “typical” week at the Nab.  However, tomorrow at 7 am we’ll meet for breakfast, pack our lunches and head off to the rainforest for 5 days!  Forest Ecology with David Foster begins in Cockscomb Basin Wildlife Sanctuary and Jaguar Preserve with some introductory hikes! Cockscomb basin has the highest density of jaguars in Central America, and is the only jaguar preserve in the world.  Monday we will be immersed in morning birding, learning about the forest ecosystem as we hike and observe, and hiking at night in hopes of seeing the animals of the forest!

Maybe someday in the future (ie at least a week from now…) I’ll have time to write about my adventures during spring break! I just got back on Thursday from an exciting trip through Guatemala!  Students arrived back on campus on Fri, and class started tonight, so we are quickly back into the swing of class!

I would love to hear from you! Hope you are all doing well.

What I love about living in Belize

I thought I would try to share some of what I love about Belize.

I love my home, Nabitunich, which means the stone cottage in Mayan. Nabitunich is the campus which is property that is rented from the Juan family, who also owns the San Lorenzo farm that surrounds our campus.

I love the fact that birds and sunlight wake me up every morning around 7.  If I’m really tired I can take a nap in the afternoon, but I can’t fall back asleep in the mornings with the active birds!

I love that I when I sit on my porch on mornings before breakfast, I see Keel-billed Toucans and Collared Aracaris (another type of toucan) taking short flights between the tall trees.  Yesterday morning I watched 2 hummingbirds fight- one was told to leave the other’s tree.

I love the fact that every moment of my day is filled with an awareness of the air around me.   I cannot be separated from my surroundings; it simply isn’t possible.  I am never in a place where I can’t hear birds in the day or the cicadas at night.  I hear the rain pattering on tin roof, and splashing from leaf to leaf of the tree outside my window as I drift to sleep. I wake up to the damp chill of foggy mornings. I sweat and drink lots of water at noon.

I love that all we don’t have the option of buying fresh produce from anywhere but the local market; almost all the fresh fruits and veggies are grown in Belize and, therefore, are in season!  Some fruits are in season all year long, others aren’t in season yet and so I’m eagerly waiting for star fruit, tamarind, and mangos to ripen! Right now the mango trees on campus have tiny fruits developing (smaller than a jelly bean!), so it will be a while.

I love the clear streams and lush forests, each of them so full of life and beauty to wonder in, to find new things in, and to appreciate more deeply each time you observe the details of life around you. 

I love the people of Belize.  Belizeans are friendly and passionate about their hometown.  You can hold whole conversations with Belizeans about why a certain town or village is the best place to live in Belize.  Belizeans know that their place, where they are from, holds value and they want to talk to you about it.

I love the multicultural aspect of Belize. When I traveled down to Southern Belize, I stayed in a village where a dialect of Mayan is still spoken in the home.  Of course, villagers who have gone to school can speak English and probably Spanish too, but the ladies cooking for us in the thatched roofed ‘bed and breakfast’ spoke to each other the language that Barbara Kingsolver describes as “a language of secrets”.  The day that I left the village I heard conversations spoken in Mayan, Creole and German, and I had held conversations in English and Spanish.  The next day I heard singing in Garifuna, a language of another black ethnic group found mostly in Belize and Honduras.

So that’s a bit of my world right now.  This week I’m the TA for God and Nature 1, taught by Sylvia Keesmaat. Hope you are all doing well; I would love to hear from you!

Since Jan 25....

Sorry for the lack of updates!  I’ve been insanely busy since I wrote last!  After orientation week, students left for travel weekend to explore Belize on their own.  I also traveled with some staff and had some great adventures in Southern Belize, which I had never been to before! 

Right after travel weekend I jumped back into work and have been working ever since!  Since travel weekend we have had one full week of class (Sustainable Community Development 1), and are now halfway into the second week (Stream Ecology). I am the TA this week, and am busy making sure everything is in order so that our days go smoothly.  Today we had an all day fieldtrip/ lab (8am to 5pm) to do stream sampling at three different streams to test for water quality, and the quality of the stream ecosystem as a whole. We also learned about some geological features that affect the streams and went to an awesome cave that has a river flowing through it!  The area around the cave is one of my favorite places because the forest is so lush and beautiful. 

Tomorrow will be class and lab here at the Nab, Thursday will be another full day fieldtrip, and Friday will bring a test, class, and final presentations on stream quality comparisons for the students.  For me, the rest of the week will be busy with time spent in class, lab, grading tests, preparing for the next fieldtrip, and planning for Celebration night, which we have every Friday night when student are done with a class!

I'm am loving life here, although I have been a little bit stressed with the beginning of classes and the amount of work to do. Right now I'm still working on creating balance between work/time with the CCSP community and time to myself, but am really hopeful that things will get better as I am more intentional about taking time for myself.  I've already been so blessed to be working with great staff, and been blessed with energy and confidence in doing so many new things!   Our CCSP community is slowly developing, and it is great to meet new professors, learn from them, and get to know them!

Also, there is at least one new post up on CCSP’s blog since I wrote last. Take care!

orientation week...

Hi, just wanted to let you all know about CCSP Belize's Blog.  http://ccspbelizes11.blogspot.com/
We (the SLC staff) will be writing this for the student's families, but it will also tell you a lot about what I'm planning/organizing and doing with the program.  There is one post up about orientation week!

The First 10 Days!

Things are good here.  It was weird to be here the first night (Sunday the 9th), but by Monday (10th) it felt good, although still surreal to be woken up by chatter of birds and seeing the beauty of the tropical landscape. All day Monday was a relax/ move in day,  and my staff orientation started on Tuesday.  It's been hot (85 my first day) then a cold front came through while we were at the beach for our staff retreat (wearing pants and a sweatshirt on Thurs the 13th because it was cold (70ish) cloudy and humid, and it got colder at night).  December is usually a rainy month but this December Belize has gotten very little rain, so the dry season is here a little early.   However, Wednesday the 12th was rainy because of the cold front that came through.  CCSP has a garden, which is growing nicely and some things are ready to be picked.  Tomatoes are starting to flower.  I'm learning a lot and gearing up for the semester. 

Since coming back, I've had a chance to walk through the farm and down along the river in the late afternoon as the temp started to cool. It's good to be looking out on pastures again, and as the cows are always on the pathway to the river, I got to experience the normal Nabitunich activity of walking through the herd of cows and watching them get out of my way.

During staff orientation we have meetings each morning until lunch and then we work on our 'to do list' during the afternoon.  I'm the only new staff person, but all the staff go to orientation meetings as things change from semester to semester and we discuss all kinds of details about how we want to set up this semester for the students.  To give you an idea of orientation, our first session was on CCSP's mission, community norms and the idea of shalom, which is a large part of our mission. Another session was about the student orientation schedule and who is responsible for planning activities, etc.  Student orientation started today when we picked up the students at the airport! Other staff meetings included discussion of staff community, our specific roles, communication, taking time for ourselves, since we work 7 days a week.

Our 'to do lists' are different based on our jobs.  I spent my afternoons setting up the lounge area (hangout spot next to dinning room), learning how to tie correct knots for hanging hammocks on the palapa, helping to fix bicycles, reading extra documents for new staff, cleaning the classroom, making name tags for student doors, forming small groups, finding keys for student rooms, and filling them with welcome materials.  All good stuff. 

Thursday through Saturday morning we had a 2 day staff retreat, which involved staying at a natural beach (hearing and seeing the ocean from our Cabanas), hiking in a national park during the day (which also involved birding and waterfalls), and playing games and getting to know each other at night.  Also, listening to a marimba "concert" and dancing!

Today (Wed the 19th) we picked students up from the airport and so our student orientation begins!  For the next 10 days I'll be working from 7:30 am til 9:30 at night! Then the students will head off on a travel weekend and I'll get time to relax.  So please pray for this busy time, as it is really important in introducing students to life in Belize and stressful for staff to be planning so many activities.  We (the staff) are already seeing the personalities of the students come out, and we are excited to get to know them better in the next couple months!

Hope you are all doing well!