Tuesday, August 01, 2006

Half way through

Here I am at the half way point. August 1st. Megan left today on an early flight back to Omaha. We'll miss her, and now its just me and Lindsay heading south. I heard the South is nice, beautiful and calm. But for right now I'm locked in a "prison" in Port au Prince, people telling me I can't go anywhere because of safety. For now I can't wait to leave the city. I'd never thought I'd say that. Its just too stressful here.

The last days in Piyon were nothing too exciting. We said our goodbyes, leaving friends we had just made after a week and promising to call and stay in contact, but knowing that that is not really feasible. Its hard when you don't have email or any connection with anyone besides a phone. I wonder how people functioned without that stuff. Letters?

I think right now I'm just in a state of numbness. There is a huge part of me that wants to go home. Not because of the food or the city, but because I want my stability back. I want to know what time I have to wake up every morning. I want to have days where I don't have to wake up at all. I want to go to work, do what I have to do, come home and sleep or go out with my friends. I want a week where I don't have to travel 4-6 hours on a road that people shouldn't be on because they're rocky, dangerous, and slippery and you have to drive to fast and go over bumps so hard that by the time you get out of the car you can't even walk for the next fifteen minutes until you get your feet back. I want to know I'm not going around and doing all this work for what feels like nothing. I want a change of scenery without the tease of traveling to a new place only to find that the office looks exactly the same on the inside. I want to feel like I'm doing something.

However, I've resigned myself to the fact that I am here for another month and ten days. Its really not that bad. I'm lucky enough to be able to see things I probably wouldn't have had the opportunity to see if I wasn't doing this job. I think I'm just a little depressed because I might have lost the most important thing in my life since my childhood through no fault of my own and I cry every time I think of it (insert my silly attachment to material things, but with reason for the emotional value).

Also, I'm sitting here in the main office in Port au Prince, knowing I'll be here for a week and have nothing to do, but read, and watching the people working here talk online and email pictures and I think, what do they do all day that I have to go out and lose my vision entering all this freaking data into the same computer. Ah! Please tell me I'm doing some sort of good in the world. I need to talk to more loan clients.

I here. I'm still smiling (most of the time) and you all know how I love to spend my days reading. And MySpacing. And eating.

They won't let me upload my pictures. I don't have access on the computer to the USB port.

Oh! On the up side! Let me just tell you that sugar cane is the most amazing thing in the world. It is the perfect candy bar. However, my dentist would not agree. Eating it is like brushing your teeth in sugar water.

So I'll be on the internet a lot for the next week. Hopefully I can take and upload more photos tonight. Send me love!

2 Comments:

At 9:06 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

ohhhhhh audrey. it does suck to sit in an office not having any contact with the people you are supposed to be helping so you get no feedback:( i am guessing that most of your sadness comes from missing me;) he he;) just try not to think of me too often;) good luck with the next few weeks!!!!!! i hope you brought your flask with you. don't let everything get you toooo frustrated.

holla,
meganb

 
At 9:27 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

This jackass I studied abroad with had a blog recently about being happy to watch local police in Bolivia kick the shit out of a few young guys who were trying to mug him. It made me miss you guys cuz he's also doing microfinance stuff, except obviously without a soul (like he was really really into watching them get beat up, sick stuff).

Why do you look all weepy in that photo on your last post? You're too cool for that, cut it out.
-Erin CP Scott

 

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