Hello from South Caicos

Well, I'm here! Actually, I got here Friday morning, but I've been so busy learning the ropes and meeting the staff, and getting ready for the students to come tomorrow. I promised Brett I'd write a little blurb about my first 2 days though, as they were very eventful. In fact, I keep describing myself as being overstimulated. I'll lay out some of the highlights for you...

First, for a little context, here's a shot looking out at the water from our dining area:

The SFS center is sandwiched between the beautiful, turquoise ocean and Cockburn Harbor, a very small town with 2 gas stations, 2 bars (known as "Chicken bar" and "Ballers" -- but I don't know why yet), one elementary school, a marina, and many, many tiny but fairly raucous protestant churches. (I can hear them singing right now.) South Caicos is apparently a pit stop along several drug trade routes, and it is not uncommon to find the locals in a, um, compromised state. The indigenous population here, known as Belongers, are more numerous than any other group, but there are also Kerala Indians as well as many people from Haiti, the Dominican Republic, and the Bahamas.

Between the South Caicos airport (in the dirt runway sense, not in the Chicago O'Hare sense) and the center, we saw many birds that I'm not yet able to identity, a flock of wild flamingos, a few packs of donkeys and horses, and a few stray dogs. After arriving at the center, I met many other interesting creatures, including the cat that roams SFS grounds, hundreds of tiny geckos running around, the mosquitos who enjoyed a fairly gluttonous feast Friday evening at my expense, the cockroaches who have made a happy home in the center's kitchen, a green turtle (I think) that one of the staffers here caught with his bare hands while swimming (see pic above), a range of beautiful and aquarium-like fish and coral, and... let's see... i think there was something else... oh yeah, i saw a caribean reef shark on my very first day here! Maybe it was to be expected, considering that we were snorkeling in an area known as "Shark Alley", but I got quite an adrenaline rush nonetheless. It was probably 8 or 9 feet long, and gorgeous. In a please-don't-come-any-closer sort of way. Unfortunately I don't have a picture of that one to show you, but you'll have to take my word for it that the experience was surreal. And yet, commonplace in these parts, I'm told.

So, yeah, the wildlife is amazing and still very mysterious to me. I'm planning to sit in on some of the Marine Ecology lectures so that I can find out a little more about what's around me. But for now, I have lots of my own planning and scheduling to do. Door tags are on all of the rooms, I've got a few icebreakers planned for students who will be hanging out at the airport with me during the day tomorrow waiting for the rest of the group to arrive, a chore schedule is set up, and I'm working on some evening activities for our first week, but there's lots more to be done. And at the moment, I've got to go tend to my bug bites and poison ivy, which are itching like crazy. (No, there isn't poison ivy here, but I got that just before I came and the hot weather really has a way of amping up the itch.) At least I've managed to avoid a sunburn thus far, and I'm steering clear of the pencil tree in our front yard that apparently causes blindness if you touch it and then touch your eyes. I'll leave you with a comforting photo of me safe, secure, (sweaty), and settling into my new home.

The doors behind me lead out to an awesome porch that's decorated with conch shells, hammocks, and lawn chairs, and always has a pleasant breeze flowing through it.