Hi everyone!!

I just got back from being in the states for two weeks. What a spectacular place! Everything is just easier there.No waiting around, you can drink water out of the tab anywhere you want, people are helpful, everything has a set price, people pick up their trash, you can throw toilet paper in the toilet, and, you don't have to ask yourself if this __________(insert food item) is going to make me projectile vomit for the next few days!I think the first thing I said, when my family asked what is different about the US when I got home, was that everything is so clean and big.The roads, the cars, the drinks, the food, the people, the dogs.All of these things are just bigger.(I know, it's weird that the people and the dogs are shorter)

Right when I returned to Peru, (and I will say, it was kind of hard to get on that plane back here.The thought crossed my mind of what would happen if I just didn't get on the plane), I raced down to my community to pick up my 2 students, going to camp VALOR.We have two camps, one for boys, the other for girls, focusing on leadership.We had presentations given by Red Cross volunteers, our doctor about sexual responsibility, the fire department, and a youth promoter on why being a volunteer is important. We also watched the incredible, played soccer and Frisbee, played lots of team building games, and camped in tents.It was definitely a great experience! The boys loved the camp.They met other people from all over Ica and Lima, from the mountains and the coast. One of the boys I brought, and each Peace Corps volunteer could only bring two, is SUPER poor. They live in a straw house, all sleep on the same mattress on the floor, and have no electricity in their house.He charges his cell phone at school because he hates asking the neighbors if he can charge it in their house! He doesn't have a dad, and his mom works in the fields all day, then takes care of him and his grandma at night.So for this boy, this opportunity was a big deal for him! He wrote, in his final evaluations, "The camp was great. There is no way for us to express it.Only that we will never forget.Truly, and sincerely, thank you Peace Corps."It just makes you want to cry!!How grateful and filled with hope that boy is!! (Good thing the Asian-Minnesotan in me keeps me from breaking down!)And for one phrase like that, all of the two years is worth it. And that phrase, I will never forget.

Miss you all!

Teigan

PS. Now I´m super stoked for camp ALMA in September (the girls´ camp)