November 15, 2008
It has been quite a while since I went out to the countryside. I’ve been busy lately with various things going on in my city and other cities, and as the weather has cooled down it’s been raining a lot. But this past week has been beautiful, and I got a few days off from school as they had their annual student track meet. Last year I competed in the track meet but this year I thought I’d take advantage of the extra days by heading out to visit my friends in my favorite small town.

I met up with my good friend, Lisa, and we headed out to a small remote town. We hung out with some of her old friends from Middle School. We walked around the town and then climbed a big hill to enjoy a view of the surrounding landscape. It was a great day with new friends.
          
   
  

I saw a dog with a really weird problem. It had black bumps all over it. Lisa tried to explain it to me but I really didn't understand her. I've never seen anything like it before.

One of the girls has lived in this very small town her whole life. She was apparently the number one student back in their Middle School days. Her brother was the top student in his class as well. But because their family is very poor, they couldn’t afford to go on to high school. She and her brother have been working to help provide a living for their family ever since they were about 14 years old. They are now both in their mid-20’s. But the family has one younger sister. She is in Middle School right now, and is also at the top of her class. The entire family is working hard so that they can afford to send her on to high school and have a better education, to have a chance to get out of the tiny town and have a decent job someday. It was really touching to me.

This girl still remembers some English, even though it’s been more than 10 years since she was in school. She was a really cute, sweet lady. It made me sad to think that the natural gift this family has been given is going to waste simply because they can’t afford to continue in their education. But I enjoyed getting to know them a little, and hopefully will see her in future trips to this small town.

After climbing up the hill, 7 of us piled on to two motorcycles and headed out of town to an orange garden. It is the beginning of the orange season here, and over the next two months I will be enjoying as many as I can eat. They are delicious and really cheap at this time of year. We walked around the garden picking and eating oranges, and took some home for later.
   

Lisa and I hopped on a “chicken bus” to head back to my favorite small town. It was really crowded and I was getting a lot of attention from the locals. They were very excited and it was fun to be with Lisa because she could understand their local dialect and tell me what they were all saying. One woman kept talking to me very excitedly. Apparently she had never seen a foreigner before in real life – only in movies. I took a picture with her and then showed it to her on my camera, which really cracked her up. We also happened to run into Lisa’s grandmother on the bus, so we made sure she got one of the few seats as the rest of us crowded together and tried not to fall over during the ride.
   

I had a great time and am heading back out for another few days this weekend.