Making progress (Josh)

The old soccer stadium

A few weeks ago we had the pleasure of seeing a couple construction projects actually see an inauguration. Oh and how they love their inauguration parties. Especially when it's a soccer stadium. Nothing brings people together here like a game of soccer. So when the new beautiful stadium with artificial turf opened it was a big deal to say the least, and we were curious what it would be like. We were told to show up at 10 am and there would be a tour of the new stadium and so we did. Sure enough a fair number of people wandering around and checking out the new shiny stadium, but no real festa. We waited around in the heat for about 5 hours with nothing really going on but a steady growing buzz of activity. Then there was an announcement that everyone had to go outside for the ribbon cutting. We thought, great this is it! As everyone was piled around the flag poles that held oversized soccer flags trumping even the country flag, the ribbon was cut and we asked, "Ok, now what?" A youth soccer game of course, to come before the official game. Oh ... well since arriving, we've decided that soccer really isn't our thing, and to sit through two games, let alone one was a bit too much. So we decided to call it a day, a little disappointed that there wasn't more a party but glad to see a major construction project come to completion where so many languish. Oh and we came to find out later that we left at a good time, as we also missed a lengthy speech in between the soccer games that "officially" inaugurated the stadium; they like their speeches too. I guess some things are universal!
The new stadium

That brings me to our second construction project that was completed and inaugurated just two weeks later: The first paved road on our island. After our lengthy day of wandering the stadium and being underwhelmed by the activities, we decided to sit the actual inauguration of this one out, thinking the cool festa portion would take place later. This time the choice was not so well advised. It turned out that there was the mother of all parties at the end opposite end of the road, and by the time we decided to go, everyone was already there partying so getting there was out of the question. Ah well, that's life.


The new road

We've enjoyed the road since then. Just this past weekend I went with my counterpart and a group of others from the Camara to a "beach" (a place where the ocean meets land that isn't a cliff side). We had a cookout and just relaxed for the afternoon. Who knew that squid was such a grilling delicacy? Who knew I'd get so harassed about not having a "picania?" (ie a girlfriend on the side)

As far as my work goes at the Camara, that's making progress too. They have actually started to do some serious data entry in the program that I created for them after I gave them an update and opened their eyes to what the application could do. I love to see the excitement build as they roll ideas around in their head about what else it could. I've even taken the opportunity to publish some of the internationalization objects I've created for dealing with different currency formatting. (http://www.djangosnippets.org/snippets/1525/) It feels pretty good to be doing what I'm actually GOOD at while I'm here.