It may not be Oprah's, but it was my book club.

So while on Utrik, there were many things to do.  My social calendar was so full, I was so constantly busy and holy cow, I just couldn't keep up.  (okay, I'm kidding.)  I had a lot of free time on my hands.  And somethings to keep me busy - watch Filippino soap operas (Luisa and Carding!!!), write epicly long letters to my friends.  (Fun side note story, the one time the plane was broken and I started writing a letter to my friend Holly (thinking the plane was coming later that week, but alas it did not come).  Well, what was originally going to be a 6 page (front and back) letter turned into a 30 page journal saga novel, and I honestly spent 6 pages talking about open faced sandwiches.  Poor Holly...)  And besides writing letters, I read - ALOT!

I was actually surprised the amount books I was able to read in such a short span - way too many.  I feel like I filled my quota for life.  But I like the over time work because I love reading.  (In fact, one of my main goals in life is to read all 7 Harry Potter books in 24 hours)  And it got to the point on island where I was reading anything I could get my hands on.  Thankfully my parents love me, and would send packages filled with books!!!  And Utrik's past WorldTeach volunteers left many many many good (and not so good) books for me to go through.  And let's just say I had a great variety and selection to pick from.

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One book that got me thinking about life was The Animal Dialogues by Craig Childs.  It was all about his different encounter with animals (as well as some information about each animal - and the information was information one would not normally find or know.  For example, mountain lions' mouth and teeth formation is perfect for biting at the base of your head. The teeth are perfect for driving into the nerves and essentially ending your life with one bite.  Or that crows are incredibly smart.  Or that mosquitos have a sci-fi tech system.  They can identify if you are male or female, spot you across a football, and can identify where you are the sweatiest.  Its rather remarkable).  But after reading this book, it dawned on me that I don't have enough experience in the wilderness.  I need to get some.  And I don't have enough experience living in a ti-pee.  But it was a very good book.

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Another book that I liked (in the lieu of many many many many I had read) was Che Guevara: A Revolutionary Life by Jon Lee Anderson.  Okay, I feel that I need to warn you first.  The book is broken up into 3 parts (and this book is incredibly long and in the middle of Part 1, I had to stop - where I read 3 crime mofia books but part 1 (for me) took a while to get through.)  The 1st part focuses on Che's beginnings and his life in Argentina.  The 2nd and 3rd parts focus on overtaking Cuba and life in Cuba, and his political and physical adventures in Africa and Bolivia.  This book made me get a different outlook on how I viewed the United States, and my opinions on Cuba.  It was well worth the read.  And now whenever I see someone wearing a Che shirt, I always stop and think - do you really know what he represents? Do you really know?

And on a funnier note, my host family had some books - mainly books explaining the different stories from the Bible, and they had a Mormon bible.  I tried to read it, and put it down after 1 page.  Yeah, no thanks.
But there was this one book -

 And honest to goodness - one of the questions inside was...

Yeah, so in the words of Mean Girls - you have your cousins, and then you have your first cousins...