Typhoons Build Character

This morning I woke up at 3:30 because my friends and I were running a 12K in Baguio: http://pusongpinoy.org/

Jeff- Be jealous, because we ran it during a TYPHOON and it was insane. They actually had to change the course the night before; it ended up being a 10K but we were fine with that. It was AWESOME. My friend Erika did the 3K, and my friend Jenny and I ran the 10K. I've never seen rain like this before. I guess it was long awaited, because we have had really nice, sunshiny weather for a long time lately. But whatever. It was a blast. Afterwards there was a traditional Benguet celebration performance by seven men and women dressed in authentic garb. It was SO cool! Google image the men's G-string and women's tapis. Love it. Then a modern dance group from the University of Baguio did a dance, as well. They were fun to watch, and surprised us with their fly moves!

Anyways the race was supposed to start at 5:30 because they weren't closing off the roads, and wanted us to finish before traffic got heavy... instead we started at 6, but people weren't driving for the most part, except for jeepneys and taxis. I hope they put pictures up on the organization's website, because once we finished, we were basically celebrities. We were super excited because we told the woman with the mic to give a shout-out to Peace Corps and it was nice to be known as more than tourists. I think 100 people must have come up to us for a picture. Then the race photographers were all about it, as well. It sounds silly, but the three of us were just as happy to meet all of them and hear their stories! After an hour or so of post-race demonstrations and celebrations, we took a jeepney home, soaking! I was soooo cold, so I boiled a pot of water and used it to take my dipper "bath." Luxurious.

We finished our co-teaching at BNHS on Friday, so this week we will be working hard on our community project, which I will explain later. In addition, this is the home stretch leading up to our Language Proficiency Interviews, in which they test us on how our Ilokano is. So, it will be another busy busy week! I'm doing my best to keep up with emails; feel free to drop me a line if you're bored~ I'll never get tired of USA life updates! I might be halfway around the world but I'm still thinking of you all!

Agannad ka!