This Friday, Tim and I will be leaving to spend the weekend at Sabana Grande where the other UD students are working. While we are just going to visit and hang out, I'll explain what they are doing there for those interested:
At Sabana Grande there is the solar center where the "Mujeres Solares" work building various types of solar ovens and apparatus for cooking, drying fruit to sell, and various other purposes. The UD group is working to combine the solar heat in an oven with a pressure cell to create a solar autoclave that can be sold to rural clinics for equipment sterilization.
Speaking with some of the UD people there, we will be mostly doing sightseeing and other various fun activities while there (swimming, a housewarming party, fun gringo stuff, etc.) I really don't know much more than that but I'll be sure to write all about it and add some pictures once I'm back.
In other news, we might be moving to a different host family due to the few things that have "disappeared" from our room, some of the unsavory conditions (yesterday the shower was infested with 300 ants and a large cockroach, and a few other small things. The family seems nice, but we've had some trouble with him wanting us to pay more than we should be also.
For instance, we wanted to use a fan at night as it is ridiculously hot here. He said fine as long as we paid for the electricity. This seemed odd as we pay Suni who in turn pays him. Then, after 10 days here he said we owed him 150 cordoba ($7) for electricity which seemed high. Douglas at Suni did the math and we found that the most the fan could use in a month is $5 worth of power, and that he isn't allowed to ask us for money, he needs to go though Grupo Fenix (Suni is a part of this) if he has monetary issues.
We'll see what becomes of this.
One other thing of note, I do have a phone here that can call the states if anyone wants to talk; it is free for you to receive the call so just leave me a comment with your number.
As I said I'll write more when we get back.
- Jim
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Well, I hope you have a great time at Sabana Grande! The project there sounds wonderful. I also hope you are moved to another "host family" soon.
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