Another Day in Paradise

I know some of you were getting a bit worried that I hadn't survived the trip out to Region Nine, since no post followed the next week, but I did! In fact, the whole trip was shockingly devoid of disaster. Lethem is not my favorite, but as the sort of central hub of Region Nine, I'm going to have to get used to it. My own town (at least what I saw in my short week there) is tiny and sweet, my new house is perfect, and the family living nearby who are "attached" to me are kind and affable, and even have horses.
My "Counterpart" (read: new colleague who agreed to put up with me for two years) is a young guy who teaches at a school for kids ages 15 to 22 which mainly focuses on Natural Resource Management,  Forestry, Agriculture, and things like that. He seems bright and competent, and I think we're gonna get along just fine.
Midway through the week, I got a garbled sat phone call from another volunteer posted in a village a few hours downriver. Turns out the last boat was coming out on Wednesday, so I had my first houseguest from Wednesday night till we left Friday morning. Lucky for him, I'd just bought myself a hammock. We strung it up on my back porch, and I think he hardly left it. Fun fact: if you're a girl and a guy is seen going into your house, the rumors start immediately. He joked about how it was probably assumed we were married, but he must have done something bad to get kicked out to the porch. I told him that if that were the case, he'd have been sleeping out in the yard instead of in my comfortable hammock. He laughed, so I think we're gonna get along fine too.
I made it back to Region Four by myself without incident, but we didn't pause in Georgetown, so no internet to post. I spent another blissful week back at my home-away-from-home with my wonderful host-family, and this week the whole crew of Environmental Volunteers (minus one who has been sick since his site visit) are back in a different part of Region Nine for Field-Based Training, which today involved climbing into a waterfall. Unfortunately, I'm having to type this all on my phone, so you'll all have to wait for pictures, but trust me, this is about as good as it gets. Welcome to Paradise.