Books, Books, I Love Books

I mentioned in my previous post the "stunning" mobile library that exists between volunteers here in Ecua-land. Just take a look at some of these titles, will ya?

And while you're at it, take a step back and admire my organization skills, please. This is why I like hosting Thanksgiving: it forces me to clean my house. This corner of the room looked pretty heinous before TDay.

That whole big shelf-console-thing was bequeathed me by a departing volunteer; hand-me-downs are a tradition among volunteers. A tradition without which I would be sitting on the floor instead of on a futon and living off cold cereal and a raw foods diet in the absence of a stove.

But anyway, back to the books.

Many of the items that get handed down - or rather, passed around - between volunteers are books. This makes me jump for joy! I was so afraid of coming to Peace Corps and being sent to a remote town without any good reading material. I lucked out in that Ecuador is a small enough country with a large enough network of bus lines that volunteers are able to visit each other fairly regularly. And they usually come with a couple pounds of good reading material stuffed into their bags.

I also lucked out because I have awesome family and friends back home who send me reading material. Without this fodder from afar, the PCV mobile library would likely never expand; it's difficult to find literature here, generally speaking, especially in the English language. So thanks, everyone who's been sending me books! Your good deeds will surely be rewarded. I hope.

(Seriously, this is quite the literary soirée: Mr. Fleming, meet Herr Goethe. Mr. Salinger, meet Señor García Márquez.)

Somehow, the library I've accumulated here has come to rival the one I have at home. These books are like friends - and they come from friends, and they remind me of friends. And there's no better frame of mind than that when I'm sitting down to open a well-worn cover and start reading.