Grenada arrival and first week


I arrived in Grenada this week and went straight to my house – no homestay. As usual, Peace Corps has placed me about as far away from the beach as possible. I like the beach! I love rivers and waterfalls and understand that one is close, so I’ll try to find it this week.

 The community is friendly and small. I’ve got a bit of a walk to school so I can greet people along the way.

My house

My house with the Atlantic in the background
I’m in a single family house. Very nice two bedrooms and one bath with a shower. I can get somewhat hot water – warm.  Most of the time, I'll just do the cold shower, the water is not that bad, Visitors, all invited, can turn the heater on...
Living room

Kitchen

Bathroom

Guest bedroom

My bed, mosquito net on bed is now put up.
I also have a washing machine – or what would pass for a washing machine in many Peace Corps sites. A plunger with holes cut in it and a real laundry sink. Basically you let the cloths soak and then use the plunger to agitate the clothes. I thought I could put it on the bottom and use the water jets created to agitate – but that did not work out so well. So I just got some exercise by mashing the clothes down over and over – it was my first time yesterday and actually very effective – clothes washing anyway – I’ll see about upper body exercise. Not as hard a pounding fufu.
"Washing machine"
But a real laundry tub with running water! It may not be a luxury in the Eastern Caribbean – but I think it is… Borehole water and a bucket – scrubbing cloths until the collars wore out – wish I had know about this in Ghana… And if I had been sent to Dominica I would not have lights for a washing machine if there was one, until maybe April. (I’m glad that I researched this technique while waiting to hear if I would be able to return to Dominica.) Very happy with the results!

School.
Children singing a greeting song
I’m in a very nice Catholic school – government run. It is rather small, looks like 6 kids in grade 1. I arrived in Grenada on Monday, was in school all day Tuesday while teachers were marking report cards for end of term. I used a little bit of the time to read to the first graders and to do a casual assessment of reading skills. Wednesday we took a trip to a floating book fair (Logos Hope), and Thursday was the Christmas party for the children and last day of class before restarting on Jan. 2. Tuesday will be the Christmas party for the teachers. I’ll get down to work at school next term.
Christmas party singing
Well - not exactly a vacation for me, Peace Corps has given me assignments during the break and I have to get the house set up. Buy an iron and other things… Bus trips and packages.  I'll be busy.
On Friday I had Peace Corps things to do in St. George. The capital is 2 bus rides away – including wait time – might be 1.5 to 2 hours. Long by Grenada standards, but I’m in a rather remote site. Not as remote as Ghana – but much harder and farther to get to Peace Corps office than it was on Dominica. But other people on Dominica had long bus rides, so things balance out….

 Next week I’ll hope to have more pictures of the area and more about settling in and integrating into the community…

Internet


 I don’t have broadband internet in the house and might not get it. (If you’re seeing this I figured out how to post it without blowing through my cellular data plan.) Grenada is a little pricier than Dominica and I’ve not figured out my budget so I don’t want to take on luxury purchases yet. (More on budgeting later). On Dominica I could use a friend’s broadband, so I didn’t have to buy it there either.

 I do have data service on my phone that most volunteers don’t have. But I want to be able to communicate as many ways as possible. (My whole disaster training and experience.) The data plan was very useful when the lights went out before Maria. The data plan that I have, same company, was about $50EC in Dominica and is about $80EC here. If I’m careful with data usage I should be able to stay under 3 gb. (And yes – I’m already putting data into a spreadsheet to track it.)

 I just have to figure all the things on the  laptop to keep it from sucking data when I hotspot. I’ve told it my wifi hotspot is metered, but it doesn’t seem to care…

Love always,
John

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