Firstly apologies if this doesn't totally make sense; it was written in a rush as I only have so much time on the internet...
Initial impressions... HOT and HUMID! The night we arrived at San Dom airport it was like walking into a suana, literally. As soon as we'd met Raoul after getting through immigration - took a while - and walked out of the doors, sweat was pouring off us and hair was stuck to our foreheads. Accommodation is a lot better than expected, yellow walls and a fridge but electricity is on and off all the time. Tonight we went in the village on our own without Lynne, starting to feel like part of the community. The village, pueblos, is full of children running around naked with massive knives who drive motorbikes every once in a while. Earlier today we got a tour of the school, saw our 'classrooms'- well I don't really have one - and got given our teaching materials. Ended up carrying English stuff from my tiny room full of sport stuff to the screen room in a wheelbarrow. Then went to the art room where we met Angelina and bridy who came running in to help us tidy. After that we saw our first TARANTULA, Bridy went running after it with a rock... We then saw Sylvia who met us for the first time on on our first wander through the village. We were invited to hers for dinner which just shows how friendly the people are, we've only been here two seconds! We also met Lorrainee and some guys who we managed to communicate with through a mixture of English and Spanish, yaaaaay our first friends! I love it here already! The village initially reminded me of out of the telly adverts for sponsoring a child apart from most of the houses being concrete. Hygiene probably isn't the strongest point in the village and so we've been warned about it by almost everyone... dinner a couple of nights ago was a prime example where the fish - which was huge - was being cut open on the ground outside of a house. Flies were on it and the water it was being washed with wasn't exactly clean. It was at this point the Rosie, Lauren and I started to worry we were going to have to eat it. Just as we were about to say we were going to leave as we were being bitten to death by mosquitos - plus we weren't actually sure if we were going to get fed! - we were invited inside. Luckily we were given egg rolls instead; not sure when they're going to use the fish. Our spanish is starting to come along too - well for me that's non-existant to the basics - and I'm picking up a couple of new words each day. Learning the Spanish gives you a little lift each day as you can feel yourself improving, haha it's only been a couple of days! Everyone is so patient and relaxed and you can sit for hours not speaking but knowing you're at peace with each other - I love it! On our way back for example we stopped off at Winita's, spoke a little spanish and just sat while watching little Vanessa playing with the cat, everyone's so friendly. Not many people are employed so sitting around is what they do. The stars last night on the way back were beautiful; it's all so clear. Also in the daytime the scenery is just magical with a light breeze blowing through the palm trees and the hills in the background - WOW! This is my home for the next year! unfortunately that's all I've got time to write; there are so many more stories about floods and fires but I'll save that for next time. Hasta luego!!!