Training in Brief (sorry I'm running short on time today)

Training is officially over and we have learned a lot. During the first month Community Health volunteers lived in Epau village in north Efate with our first host families. We learned a lot about Vanuatu culture and much more about health in Vanuatu. STDs, NCDs and Malaria are just a few of the health problems the wonderful population of Vanuatu are dealing with.

For a week in the middle of these past 2 months we got the privilege of going to our specific sites for a week and checking out our new homes. Kerembei, Maewo is beautiful, filled with lush landscapes. I am living in my own concrete house next to the health center that I will be working in conjunction with.

me outside my new home :)

Maewo is the island of water because it rains a lot and there are plenty of rivers and waterfalls. But this water means that there are also a lot of mosquitoes, so I will be bringing plenty of bug spray.

The second month of training we switched with the Education volunteers and lived with a second family in Sunnai, Moso, an island that is a 10 minute boat ride away from Efate (Efate is the island where the capital is located). We got to swim a lot while on this island which was amazing! It is like swimming in a post card and we swam almost every day.

The only time we weren't able to swim was for a few days when a cyclone passed through Vanuatu. It wasn't too bad - just a lot of wind and rain but we had to make sure to stay in/around our houses because walking around/swimming in cyclones is dangerous. We learned even more about culture in Sunnai though, weaving baskets, making local food and having plenty of time to talk to our families and ask questions. The last week we were in this village we also learned how to make a VIP toilet (VIP meaning ventilated improved pit latrine).

VIP Toilet in progress