Post-move update

I haven't posted since we moved into Tradewinds, so I'll give an update on the new living situation. It is very nice by Kosrae standards. However, as anyone who has lived with me can attest to, I am typically a neat freak and I like things to be clean, so it has been a little bit of a challenge for me to adapt to this new living arrangement. The bugs here are pretty much impossible to keep out, not to mention the gecko things that crawl around too. I had all of these at my host family's as well, so I've had some time to get used to it, but it's definitely a change from what I am used to. We've been cooking together for the most part, but the first couple days our meals were typical college students with ramen and hot dogs being our main caloric intake. However, a cold ship came in on Monday (which you totally can't appreciate unless you live on an island that relies on cold ships for produce that only comes in every few weeks), and we were able to get some vegetables! I was extremely excited, because veggies are pretty scarce on the island. There are a ton of cucumbers, which are really delicious by the way, and a lot of fruit, but no vegetables. This appears to be the result of two things: most veggies don't grow here, and people here love their rice and sugar, so they aren't too concerned with vegetables. Anyway, to sum up my tangent, the past 24 hours has been filled with delicious vegetables and I was really excited about it. Although most of the dogs around are mean, our landlord's dogs are actually very sweet, so I have finally been able to get some puppy love that I have been missing out on. It's so hard to see all the dogs and not be able to go pet them. There's one especially mean one on the way to school that I actively avoid. The weekend was nice, especially being in our own place. I loved my host family, but it is nice to have a place of my own where a ton of family isn't constantly coming and going. I am already staying in touch with them and plan to stay very close to them all year. They are a very short bike ride away, and are so sweet and make me feel welcome anytime. They brought me a plate of dinner to my house on Sunday so that I wouldn't have to cook! I went over today and went swimming with Kokok and Falan, and I frequently see the rest of the family because of the trips to Ace Hardware and grocery since all of them work there. I feel so lucky to have gotten put with such a wonderful family and that I am only living a short distance away so I can still see them all the time. I had the time to swim today because we got a last minute week off this week. We were supposed to start school today, but it got postponed until Monday, so now we have the week to do whatever we want. This is the first of many times that the schedule will change at a moment's notice, but that's island life for ya! Everything is relaxed and will get done when it gets done. Since I had everything planned and ready to go for this week, I don't really have any extra work to do and can really enjoy the time off. I'm hoping to go fishing and maybe kayaking this week to make use of the time. I want to post pictures of everything so far, but the internet here is really slow and it takes forever to get even one up, but just so everyone knows, you are really missing out on some beauty.