little of this, little of that.

a few things:

-so one of my goals since i got here was to force the creation of a new rule for the orientation packet and i´ve successfully done so already...let me explain. in the orientation packet there are a bunch of rules/guidelines to remember while we´re here. some of them make complete sense but some you can tell were added later because of certain things that happened. for example, one states that we are to refrain from putting furniture on the roof and living up there...cuz that apparently happened one semester. so my rule says that we are to refrain from harming (or attempting to kill) our CC (community coordinator) with the oven (basically to use caution when using the gas ovens). so last tuesday my friend Andy and I were on dinner duty which means that we have to set the table and warm up the food. easy enough right...think again. its a gas oven and since we had gotten in salv ive used the stove top countless times to heat up water for my tea. well i guess i forgot the oven was also gas (i know i know, im an idiot...throw me a bone) so i put the pans in the oven and "turned it on" aka turned the gas on but didnt light it. (you can see where this is going...) so it had been on for i would say 3 minutes and i opened the oven to see how things were going but i was confused because nothing was even a little warm. so i got nervous and turned it off just then remembering that it was a gas oven...oops. so i told Megan, our CC to ask for some help lighting it, and yes i mentioned that i had turned the gas on for a bit. we apparently had not waited long enough because Megan lit a match with her arm extended as far as possible to be careful but when she moved it towards the oven a big whoosh of flames spit out and me andy and megan all screamed. have no fear though, no one was actually hurt (not even the food). the only damage was to Megans leg hair, which was singed off from the heat. my bad.

-milk is really expensive here so instead of buying the regular stuff, we have powdered milk (basically add water and poof...instant "milk"). Jim, one of my fellow Billikens, who lives in the same house as me decided one morning last week to make some more milk since the pitcher was low and grabbed what he thought was the powder for the milk. he stirred it up and and everything seemed to be fine. megan even poured some in her cereal and thought that it tasted a bit funny but then thought it was just her being crazy and forgot about it. then at dinner we were getting everything out, including the milk and we noticed that it was pretty much completely separated, clear on the top, white on the bottom. we opened the top and tried to stir it but found that it was basically paste...he had used flour instead of the powder...haha. we all laughed pretty hard about that one.

-ive decided to try being a vegetarian while im here. i dont really have any hard core reasons...im kind of just curious. not only that but i think if i could do it anywhere, it would be in salvador. here's why: although i truly do love meat #1.) i have pretty strong willpower (aka...I'm a stubborn German) and #2.) the cooks in our houses make so many delicious vegetarian options because there are a hand full of other vegetarians. I've found myself picking them anyway. I have confidence that I'll at least be fine while I'm here...but no promises for when i get back to the states since there are so many tasty chicken/beef/pork/ham/etc temptations.

-safety is always something we talk/think about here. its strange because i have a really hard time not comparing salvador with nicaragua but i do that with safety too. i feel safer here then i did while i was in nicaragua. maybe its the part of town were in, or the fact that we have Saul/William guarding the houses every night. on wednesday when i was at praxis, we were talking with the women at the soy project and they told us that the morning before, a 17 year old young man was killed on the same street we were on. they said that the police didnt say how he was killed but my guess is that it was maybe gang activity since thats such a huge problem in the country. its just things like that that make me remember where i am. i think i still have a romanticized version of salvador in my head, which is good cuz no one wants to live in fear, at least i dont, but its important to remember the reality of the situation too. salvador is a beautiful country with so many things to offer, but there are still some very ugly things that happen here and its important to recognize it for both.