It´s only been a week?!

Friday marked the end of my first week in my training town (please excuse my not disclosing it fully--Peace Corps policy). It feels like I´ve been living here for quite a while now. So much has happened. Each day begins around 5:30 for me as I wake up to the sun shinning into my room and the sounds of the neighbors´roosters crowing. At first it drove me crazy as I couldn´t fall back asleep after that and just lied there awake waiting for a reasonable hour to get ready for the day (and dreading that ice cold shower).
More recently, however, I´ve been using that time more effectively by working out a little and then joining two of my fellow trainees for a jog around town. We must make quite a site! Three gringos just running around town at 6 in the morning. Beyond the general health benefits and a way to keep down the pounds from the very large and heavy portions my host family serves me, working up a sweat makes that cold shower not just tolerable, but a general relief.
After getting ready I make my way to the houses of two of the other trainees house so that together we can walk to the last trainee´s house where Spanish class is at. Oh yes, Spanish class. After my language interview in Managua, I knew I definitely needed some help with my Spanish, but arriving at my training town brought new issues to light. The Spanish here is not that which I grew up with, the accent is quite different (some people keep mentioning how Cuban mine is), they never use the pronoun tu, only usted and vos. Yes, vos, which sometimes requires a different tense of the verb. And to top it all off, I have to learn whole new words for things I already knew. Sandals are chinelas, adios is hello, and the word pulove does not work here.
It´s pretty warm here, but overall the weather is actually nicer than it is in Florida. At night the temperature cools down quite a bit (to the 70s) and there aren´t too many mosquitos (although I still sleep with a mosquito net and take cholorquinine (a very bitter and unpleasent tasting Malaria medication that gives you vivid dreams)).
Training is a lot of work and can be quite stressful. As it is I have a lot of trouble staying up past 9:30 at night. Beyond just working on my Spanish, I also have techinal training which ranges from things like making maps of my town, interviewing the people here, and learning to make a garden. I also have to do several projects during the 10 weeks of training, including running an environmental youth group and teaching a fifth grade class.
Both of these projects have been hard to start. The youth we´ve been trying to get together keeps falling through. Eventually we found a class of third year students (thats 8th grade, I think) willing to be part of our group, the school director is giving them community service hours for it. So basically my group is a charity case... Teaching at the school also makes me nervous. The kids are rowdy, and never raise their hands, just all yell out what they´d like to say at the same time! I´m going to try my best though.
Overall I have to say, I´m having a great time, making friends, liking my town, and getting excited for the work that I do.
Till next time!