How the other side of Ambae lives!

 I live on West Ambae and a boat or plane ride away on the other side of Ambae is Rachel.  She is a volunteer that has already been here about 2 years.  I have been there to visit a few times and thought I would show you how the other half lives :)

Rachel's house is owned by the provincial government and has been a Peace Corps volunteer house for years.  It is only about a 5 minute walk for her to get to the Provincial office where she works.

Her house has lots of modern day conveniences but not necessarily at our American standard of living.  Compared to a long drop toilet and bamboo walls this house is "flas."  She has some comfortable chairs, a sitting room, 2 bedrooms, flush toilet, cold water shower, and kitchen with a working sink. 

 This village has a large generator that runs M-F from 8:30 AM -9:00 PM and just in the evenings on Saturday and Sunday.  Thus she can watch movies, use her computer, charge her phone, have working lights, etc.  Lucky!  No internet...yet...

It is a bit hot in there though...Rachel why don't you get an air conditioner?  haha j/k

On one of my visits we had to wait for days because the ship didn't come on schedule (well it never comes on schedule).  So in our free time we found lots of things to entertain ourselfs.  My favorite was we watched the complete season 1 of Burn Notice.  Even the yams became entertainment!

  

Even though she may have a fancy house, she still has some creepy neighbors!