My assignment!

I´m going to the coast! I´m super excited about my site...I sounds as though it was tailored for me! It´s a small coastal town in the Manabi region. I´ll be primarily working on watershed managment, but also on the protection of a turtle nesting beach, ecotourism, and reforestation (mangroves?) I´ll also be one of the few volunteers who is working with a bigger NGO on the grassroots level, which a huge potential advantage as I´ll probably have funding for my projects and a little more structure. My counterpart whom I will be working with extensivly over the next two years is also supposed to be great. FURTHERMORE the view from my house ( where I will be living for at least three months) is absolutly spectacular. I´m very, very lucky. I´m leaving tommorow for an entire week at my site before returning for one more week of technical training, and then further training in a coastal area with other volunteers.
Yesterday they told everyone their site by creating a big map of Ecuador on the floor and calling us one by one so that we could see the people we were closest too. Not everyone is excited as I am with their site...there were a few tears. Luckily, I´m fairly close to one of my friends Kiki from my community...but everyone else is a fair distance away. I´m also a little afraid of the language barrier because everyone on the coast drops vowels and s´s and speaks way too fast. If I survive, I´ll be fantastic at Spainish by the time I return. It sounds as though I will have internet access, water, and telephone service at my site. I´ll let you know more once I´ve finished exploring this week!
Choi!