the peace corps guys

It´s strange really to be one of five gringos in a town, but it´s really nice to have a ready-made group of friends as well. And the guys are really fun as well. On Wednesday they taught me how to play poker (I think I played video poker in Vegas, but I wasn´t really paying attention, just playing slowly so I could get the free drinks!). But I guess they were really good teachers b-c I won!!!!!!! That´s right, I won at poker, and took home a whopping 40 lemps (a little more than 2 dollars), but I certainly have bragging rights, which I value more. I can´t decide if I want to never play poker again, lest my beginner´s luck run out, or if I love it and want to play all the time now!!

It´s interesting to be kind of on the inside of the Peace Corps here. Obviously if I don´t get in I will be rather bitter, but if I do I may be much more prepared than I would have been otherwise. Honduras is perhaps an atypical assignment -- these guys each have their own apartments right next to each other, in a town with internet access and cell phones. There´s a huge community of PC volunteers here, mostly because there are so many of them - 250 total, more than in any other country in the world except for Ukraine!! They talk a bit about the politics of the PC, how the new director was appointed by Bush to be a budget-slasher and nothing more. These guys are also a bit less busy than I had expected. Sim teaches a philosophy class at a local high school twice a week. That´s it!! He does some other projects on the side, but I wouldn´t say it´s even a 12 hour work week. The other two guys are similarly chill. It´s hard to judge, b-c I also realize that we work a lot at the school (25 hours a week!) and I probably couldn´t keep that up in a foreign country for more than a few months at a time. They´re in a marathon, really, conserving energy for two years of being here. That´s a bit hard for me to imagine.

This weekend we´ve all decided to stay in town and it should be fun. There´s a biological reserve nearby (Guisayote?) where one of the guys has been working to build up the tourist industry and training guides, so we´re going to make use of that. There´s also some band coming into town that´s been talked up a bit, and there´s a karaoke place as well. Plus, the guys have begun delving into my dvd collection, and there was talk of a hangover movie marathon with pancakes and mimosas. All in all, a chill weekend at home sounds nice. Yesterday, the power went out and we read all afternoon. This is the life!!!