Beach celebration!

Hi Everyone!

We made it through Mini 1!! Sam came through with flying colors! It's really nice to see all the hard work he's put in these last few weeks pay off. Now that mini 1 is out of the way, the rest of the semester is going to fly by. We're already half way through!

We celebrated today by going to Batibou Beach on the other side of the island with James and Mary. It was a much-needed break. The beach is beautiful, on the Atlantic side and completely secluded, we had it all to ourselves. The boys built a fire and we roasted hot dogs and marshmallows. The boys ran around and chopped random things with their machete's while Mary and I relaxed on the beach. It was a GREAT way to spend the afternoon.

On Friday, I had the privilege of going on a community outing for Friends of Espwa, the hospice and palliative care organization I'm part of. I met a wonderful lady who has been living in the area her whole life. She is largely alone now, and struggles a lot with loneliness and has a lot of health issues. If you could think to pray for her, she would really appreciate it. On Thursday we had a huge thunderstorm, and the roof of her house leaked all over her bed. Now that it's hurricane season, she's really afraid of being safe in her house through it. I was able to read some of the Bible to her, because she is unable to read herself which makes her really sad I think. But she was a very friendly lady who would really appreciate you all praying for her.

On Thursday, we had an awesome thunderstorm! Although we get lots of rain, this was the first time really we'd had any significant lightning and thunder. But we certainly got it on Thursday, and it continued to rain pretty much all day Friday. It was beautiful. I still love the rain, even though we see it a lot more frequently down here than in GJ. The downside of rain here though, is that it really overwhelms the water system. Usually the water will just turn brown and be un-drinkable for a couple days, but this time they shut it all the way off! We were without water for a full 24 hours, and it's amazing how much you miss it even for just that short amount of time. We had drinking water saved, the hard part was not having water for washing, showering and flushing the toilet. But it finally came on again this morning, so it is much better! Although it still isn't clear so we're boiling it before we drink it, but at least it's available!

That's pretty much all of our exciting news. Things are slowing down a little now, but not for my school schedule. Kubuli is recovering well from getting fixed, Sam took her stitches out tonight. It's raining some more, so hopefully we'll keep our water! Hope you all are enjoying your summer back home! We miss you lots!

Love,
Katrina

June 9th Update

Hi Everyone!

Time for another update!

Well, 3rd Semester is well underway and Mini 1 is sneaking up on us quickly. Fortunately, the work load is much more manageable for Sam this semester, and he's enjoying having some new subjects to study. This semester he has pathology, microbiology/immunology, behavioral science (a little bit of intro to clinical medicine) and pharmacology. Things are going well so far, we'll see how it all looks after the mini, which is Monday the 16th.

Classes are going well for me. I'm finally into the upper level courses, and while I'm really enjoying the material of the class, the workload is a lot more than it has been in the past. I am really trying to stay caught up. Starting next week, my classes for next session will be starting, so I'll have a double load for 2 weeks--that will be fun (not).

A couple of weeks ago we got to have Danae and her friend Nicole come for a visit! It was really nice to be able to spend some time with my sister, as well as Nicole. The three of us rented a car and went gallivanting around the whole island. It was really fun! We got TONS of catcalls, got lost several times and managed to not fall in any ditches! I've added a bunch of pictures that I took while they were here. This first one is taken on the beach right by our house, the first night they got here.

One of the funnest things we did was go River Tubing on the Layou river with the faculty spouse group! I don't have any pictures of us actually on the tubes, but it was a lot of fun. The guides were a lot of fun, the river was relaxing but still fun, and we had a great time! The Layou River is one of the biggest in Dominica.

Sisters!
Danae and Nicole, standing on Scott's Head Point, looking over the Atlantic.

Danae climbing the ruins at Cabrits.


The next couple pictures are from one of the coolest things I've done on the island. This is the Riviere Cyrique hike, and basically all we had to do was scale a cliff down to a secluded beach where a waterfall fell into the waves of the Atlantic. The climb down was pretty intense. There were a few ropes and one rope ladder that were there to help us get down the vertical part, along with the roots that covered the cliff face. We made it down though, and once our legs stopped shaking, we were able to make it to the beach! It was so cool!

Nicole heads down.

There's Danae...down the first part of the cliff.

This pictures shows how the roots were able to help us down.

This is the rope ladder. The scary part about it was that as soon as you got on it, it pulled away from the cliff!

And we made it! It was definitely worth the trip! The fall was beautiful, but so was the beach! We got to play in the splashing waves, collect sea shells (cuz this is the Atlantic side), and have a picnic, all on our own private beach. It was awesome.

The beautiful Sari-Sari falls. Even after we made it there, we weren't able to stay very long because there was already a group of like 6 guys smoking pot there, so we didn't linger. Lol. That's a pretty common sight here, unfortunately.

Bonfire on the beach! Sam and James were able to come down after class and join us for some hot dogs on the beach as the sun set...it was really fun.

On their last day here, we drove the Northern Link Road through the volcano. This is a picture of the Cold Soufriere Springs in the middle of the volcano crater. Yes, the water was cold, but it was coming directly from the volcano...you could tell from the smell.

This is the volcano crater that we drove through. It's hard to tell in this panoramic shot, but the area was a complete circle.

We got so lost going to this pool! And the sad thing about being lost here, is that anyone around knows your lost. For example, we drove through one village to get here, and had to loop aroudn a couple of times, and all over the streets were people just watching. Fortunately though, they're friendly enough to point you in the right direction...you just have to listen! When we got there the water was really cold and really deep, and...it kind of freaked us out. But it was a fun day still.

Poor Kubuli had a rough day on Saturday. I had to take him to Roseau to get neutered. It was a long day and he didn't like the box I had to carry him in, but after I left him at this random building that supposedly was a vet's office, I had about 6 hours to blow in Roseau. Finally the vet called and said they were done but, did I know that my cat was a female?? Sam and I had thought she was a boy for the last 5 months of her life! But I finally I got bring home a very unhappy, female cat to recover. It was a long day but unfortunately was necessary! We don't want any more kitties!

Well, that about wraps up our news! It's really hot here now. I keep thinking I'm going though menopause or something, because even just sitting at the desk in our house all day I'll just be covered in sweat! But we still like it here for sure. We're definitely missing family and everyone back home. Hope everything is well, and we'd love to hear from anyone! I don't know if anyone even looks at our blog anymore, but for those that do, we appreciate it!

Take care,
Katrina