Mtn Province

Howdy folks,
Im writing from Bontoc, Mtn Province where you would swear you're in the middle of Texas with all the country music. Last night I went to see my friend's band and I got up and sang Country Road Take Me Home, the crowd loved it. Dustin, my buddy from Ifugao, sang The Gambler, and Nancy sang Have You Ever Seen the Rain. I was sick with Dhengue fever 2 weeks ago, so I was dying to get out of site and go have some fun. Last weekend I went to Kiangan and met like 7 other volunteers, Jill, Sherry, Eva, Dustin, Lina, Kelly and Peyton, you can see them all in the pictures at snapfish. About 3 weeks before that Eva and I went to Sagada, where we did the cave connection. Its about 4-5 hours of cave exploring with bats, cold pools, rock climbing and rapelling. I also started my language lessons with a new tutor, so Ive been picking up the dialect and making new friends in my town. Today I am going to Baguio, a change in plans, because one of my best friends here is getting kicked out of the peace corps. He did some pretty bad things at his site that I dont think he wants me to disclose. Its really sad, he is a great guy, hilarious, we are going to miss him here for sure, having one of us get sent home is like losing one of your soldiers. So hes packing up his stuff and a few of us are going to go say goodbye to him. In a week there will be the all important final inspections of the rice before we ship it to manila. My coworkers and I have been busy meeting with all the farmer leaders making sure everything is right and of course everything is not right. SOme of the seedlings they planted were mixed red and white imbu-an varieties. NOw they have to separate by hand all the red and white grains. Quality is quality and the same mistake wont be repeated next year but as for this year, this is a huge blow to their confidence. After inspections are over I ll be going to Iloilo in the visayas for the 2nd segment of peace corps training. It lasts a lil over a week and ill be using some vacation days to do some scuba diving down near Boracay beach, one of the most famouns white sand beaches. So ill be gone from site for about a month almost. Ive been getting closer with the volunteers here, especially Eva, she's a blast and we're just very compatible so things are pretty good. We are planning a trip together to 100 Islands Natl Park in October, first chance for us to get away. I bet it sounds like Im doing a lot of play and little work. Not true, I just like to write about the exciting stuff. Work is great too, I am taking a leading role more and more and I need that, it motivates me to have my own challenges and not have someone padding my back through it all. Well thats all for now. Oh pops or mom can you check into my Wells Fargo account, my check card got deactivated somehow, call me to get account number and we'll figure it out. Alright, with love everybody, take care of yourselves, dont get dhengue it sucks and if you do, make sure you get a companion to take care of you, next time Ill fly to the states just to get some company. Love and Peace all you hippies, Adam