Success.

Let me tell you what I’ve succeeded in lately:

§ I’ve successfully managed to neglect my blog for over a week and a half! All my apologies…but I have been busy!

§ Our camp day last week was definitely a success, and that is what many of the pictures were from below. We took a group of about sixty kids from three different centers out to the middle of the wilderness, surrounded by waterfalls (several!), jungle, palm trees, and just plain simple beauty. The kids absolutely loved it, even though it felt like we really did nothing to help organize or plan the day. But we sure had fun…and it was a LONG day that involved leading kids over a rickety old bridge, hiking to the top (ish) of a mountain, doing a river walk, swimming, etc. It was a blast, and I was also successful in getting an amazing sun burn. I guess I have gotten lax about applying sunscreen! Oh yes, and I was also successful in being in bed by 7:13 last Saturday night. Oh, the madness.

§ Another success this week has been conducting a staff training for the staff of four different centers entitled, “Life Skills: Importance and Facilitation”. Now don’t go thinking we’re all amazing or anything. Really, there were four of us conducting the training and only twelve participants, and it only lasted two hours. Oh yeah, and I don’t really know if they got anything out of it! We hope so though, but that will remain to be seen. I think the concept of life skills is definitely known to be important and crucial to a child’s well-being, but there seems to be a mental block or apprehension as to how to actually implement and facilitate life skills activities. All in all, though, we were successful.

§ We were also successful at completing our community project! Yes, that’s right—we finished the clothing drive and were able to give ALL the kids something on the day of their life skills activities. That was the main part of our project—our life skills day. We focused on teamwork, conflict management, relationships, and values, and all our activities went so well. I worked on teamwork activities, and the second activity I used involved having one child lay on the ground and having the others lift him up and carry him to another location. In order to do this, each member of the group was responsible for a different part of the body (legs, shoulders, arms, head, feet, etc.). Everything went so great—well, except one kid did end up balling right in the middle of my activity—yeah, I don’t really know, but I would still consider it overall a success. The funny thing is that most of these “trust” or “adventure” activities that I often facilitate, I really haven’t done them much myself. As my cluster mates have pointed out (fairly and objectively), I really have an issue with trusting people. Well, that’s definitely the truth, and it’s a bit ironic that I lead these “trust” activities but have a hard time doing them myself. Take trust falls for example. Anytime I am in a position to do a trust fall (like the mini ones, with only one partner), I freak out and always put my foot back as support, which is exactly what one is not supposed to do. Anyways, the point of this ridiculously unorganized story is that I was successful in doing a trust activity! The last group that I had for my teamwork groups convinced me to try it, so yes—I was lifted by about 9 young boys and carried about 50 feet, with no trust problems whatsoever! Pshh…trust issues. So therefore, I was successful.

§ We were also successful in wrapping up our technical training this week. No more tech training! We do have one more week of language training, though, which is definitely needed considering this week I was VERY successful in discovering my lack of the Cebuano language. We have our Language Proficiency Interviews next week, and so this week we did a mock interview with our LCF. My problem is that I can speak the language alright, but as far as understanding what other people are saying, I have no clue. I might even understand every word in the sentence but still have no clue what the sentence means. There are a million affixes and focuses that the Cebuano language uses (kind of like tenses in English…but actually, totally different), but most of the time, I’m left wondering, “So who’s doing what to whom? When did this happen? Where? And with what instrument? And this is past tense or present…or future? What are we talking about?” It’s so darn confusing. I am definitely in the future going to become VERY successful at learning the language, darn it.

§ This morning I was successful at finally beginning some sort of exercise program here in the Philippines. Even though I am usually hard-core about staying in shape and going to the gym (and YES, okay, I do eat tons of junk food, but hey—who are you to judge? Haha) at home, here I’ve definitely slacked. This could be because of the medium amount of walking we do daily from our homes to our training sites anyways, or it may have more to do with the stifling heat and the ridiculous humidity, or it could be the smoky air and the reactions of my asthma, or it could be the lack of any great space to “exercise” in private, or it could be all of the above. Hm. Well, this morning, I woke up and definitely decided that it was finally time for some exercise. I’ve been trying to do some of my yoga exercises, but I’m really bad at leading my own workout (I usually have workout ADD and get distracted). So today I dug out my pilates DVD! Thank you, Denise Austin, for putting joy and rock-hard core muscles into my life. I owe you big time. I’ve never sweated so much in my life, I’m pretty sure. I only have one outlet in my room (and by one outlet, I mean only ONE outlet….not a set of two outlets), so it was necessary to have the computer plugged in and the fan unplugged. This equals large amounts of dripping sweat. Not that you have any desire to hear about it whatsoever, but I just thought I’d share. Another reason today has been successful (and why I L.O.V.E. Sundays, which is our rest day) is that I was able to rid myself of my man-legs, thanks to a nice cheap Bic razor and the fact that I showered during the day, which meant it wasn’t too cold to actually stand there and somewhat shave my legs. SOOOO amazing Sundays are. AND soon I will be successful in eating an amazing lunch of Mexican food. Have I mentioned how I love Sundays?

§ I guess I have also been successful in posting this blog.

§ And I have also become successful in missing autumn at home. Sad.