Soap and Sheep

Well, this has been an interesting week! Two of my Argentinian roommates left, but one of them (Noe) is still here. We had an Argentinian asado the night before they left, which was also Noe's birthday. It was a fun party - we grilled meat and toasted bread and drank a lot of wine :) Since then, things have been all over the place. I had to work in the laundry for a couple of days to try to figure out what was wrong up there - there have been a lot of problems with clothes not getting clean and taking too long, so I followed around the laundry girls and wrote a little report. Then I went back to the garden (yay!) and learned how to make soap out of used kitchen oil. How interesting! It was a little chemistry lesson, and it was really cool to mix. Noe wants to start a new project to experiment with making different types of soap. I want to learn how to use glycerine, but we haven't done that yet. Mosco says the soap you can make with glycerine is better, but usually it's kind of expensive. Pop, he thinks you could be selling yours if you're not using it :)

Yesterday, Noe and I had to herd sheep! That was the most hilarious job I have done so far. I mean, I was laughing all day. We had to take the sheep out of their pen and move them to another field because there was no grass left in the one they were in. We were supposed to watch them/move them around for a few hours, clean their pen, and then move them to the dairy so they could be treated for some various illnesses. It took us a good 15 minutes to get them out of the pen and moving down the road. Noe was running back and forth across the pen, and they just kept galloping in circles. I was standing outside in the road laughing. We finally got them out to the field, lost them a few times, and then ran them back to the pen by accident. It took us a while, but overall we thought we were doing pretty well. However, that changed after lunch. After lunch, Mosco asked us to go get the sheep and take them to the dairy. We went back down to the pen, ran them out, and starting moving down the road. About 50 yards down the road, they veered under a fence and took off across a small field. I was closer, so I ducked under the fence and took off after them. Unfortunately, we were wearing flip-flops at this point, because for some reason, we thought this part would be easy! Did I mention that these sheep are very scared of people? I chased them through a couple of fields, to another road, and halfway up towards the mountain. Then I decided I had to head them off, so I crossed into some more fields and starting traversing, ducking under fence after fence, until I got ahead of them. I ran them all the way back down towards Noe, back to the other road, and they ran right around her and directly back to their pen! I was laughing so hard that I thought I was going to pee in my pants! We starting out screaming "Good sheep, good sheep" and within 5 minutes we were screaming "Puta madre! Ovejas estupidas!" We had to start all over, but the second time I crossed into the fields from the beginning and followed alongside the road, crawling under fences as we went. When we got almost there, they tried to run down another road, and I ended up running all around the stinkin' farm, for about a half a mile to head them off, yelling at the garden guys to please help us with the fucking sheep! They just looked at me like I was nuts. Anyway, we finally got them into the barn. By the time I got back from my run two guys had come to help Noe, and they were just getting them inside. I will never forget that experience, for sure!

Last night we went to the closest small town to a hotel bar with a few friends. One of the guys is leaving tomorrow, so we went to have a little party. Today, Noe and I had the day off, so we ate breakfast late, talked a lot and drank a lot of coffee, and took a nap. She's really cool, and I'm enjoying getting to know her. I think we might go to El Castillo (a small pueblo near here) for dinner with one of the other volunteers, a guy from Florida, tonight. We'll see.

Mosco (my supervisor/friend) asked me yesterday if I would consider staying for another month to help him develop an education program he's working on. He wants some help writing the English materials and putting the information on the webpage. I have to think about that a lot because I really like Mosco and I like working with him, but I'm not sure I want to stay that long. I was planning on leaving after I go to Earth University with him on Wednesday. Hmmmm...

Let's see, only one other piece of news. I heard from the job in the Galapagos, and they wanted to know if I could come earlier than the time period I applied for. They sent the email to 5 people, and I replied yesterday saying I could come at the earlier time, so I'm waiting to hear back whether or not that means that I got the job. I hope so! If so, that will mean I need to be in Ecuador at the end of January.

Well, I hope everyone is well. Post and let me know if you're keeping up with the blog, and how you are!

Aura