Hi. This is Kory today. I would first like to say that Heather appologizes for including political commentary on this our friendly blog. We have no intentions of turning this blog into a political forum. I would also like to say that, as intelligent rational human beings, we recognize that being Muslim and being a terrorist have nothing to do with one another. Thank you for understanding. Feel free, however, to comment on any other aspect of your lives. P.S.-we are registered to vote absentee, though it wont caount unless it is very very close.

As for Peace Corps work, we have much to report on for this week. First of all, I gave my highschool students their test on the sexual health series that I have been teaching them (Heather administered hers last week) and my 71 students (roughly twice that size of Heather´s classes) blew her´s out of the water with their scores. I admit that this was largely due to the fact that as my series was a week behind her´s, since we were using the same materials, I had the advantage of correcting and adjusting to our original mistakes. I also did an intensive soccer based review the week before the test. Anyway, we are done with that part for now, but when the new year begins in January, we plan to teach the series again to many more students. (In her defense, Heather and I are returning to her school to do the soccer-based review to make sure that these kids get something out of it.

We harvested some sugarcane from our back yard this week as well. We went back and chopped it down with our machette and then skinned it. (The skinned end in the photo is in my mouth, the part in the foreground is not skinned.) Then you just chew on it. It is so wet and juicy. It just pours sugarwater down your face. Mmm. The next morning I made crepes with pineapple and sugarcane syrup for breakfast.

We had our first radio program with our kiddos. They were so nervous, but they did awesome. It was the first time I have seen any Nicaraguan be on time to anything. And this is a youth group! Since today is the national mental health day, the program was about depression. They were a little short on information but it was their first time. We hardly had to help them at all! It was a great success for us. We´ll see if they can prove successfull under the test of time. Unfortunately, we forgot the camera so there will be no pictures of the radio work until the next show, on the 24th.

We went to a festival at the Highschool for el Día de la Resistencia wherein everybody celebrates the time when the Spanish arrived here and the indiginous peoples said "Hell No!" (basically). There is more to it than that, but that´s all you need to know. So they have a sort of pagent to elect a reina indigina or Indian Queen! The students, one from each class, dress up in costumes they make from natural things, such as coconut bikinis and corn grass skirts, and they have to answer questions and do pagent things. Well, being the esteemed sexual health teacher that I am, I was asked to be one of the prestigous invited judges. I got to judge the Indian Queen pagent! The big bored looking man next to me is the vice mayor of La Dalia. I guess it wasn´t as novel for him.

Here are the "queens" lined up. Some of them have escorts as well. Indian-lookin duders.

This is a picture of our friend Luis, who teaches English at the school, with his "queen." They also build indiginous huts out of natural things, one of which you can see in the background, from which they sell foods and drinks to each other. The eats are also judged. (notice the dog is wearing a coffee bean collar).