In place of our monthly meeting, a 2 hour workshop will be offered focusing on the Spanish language and culture. As many EWB projects are located in Central and South America, the need for a basic understanding of the language and culture of these areas is critical to improve the success of these projects. As a Returned Peace Corps volunteer who worked and lived in Central America, the facilitator of this workshop can attest to the correlation between good communication and the success of a project.

The objective of the workshop is not to attempt to teach the entire Spanish language but to give EWB engineers the background and skills needed for basic communication in the host country. We will focus on pronunciation and the basic grammatical structure of Spanish so that an engineer armed with a dictionary and phrase book will be able to maximize there use. While basic survival phrases will be briefly covered the majority of the workshop will focus on engineering-based conversations and words not likely found in a typical tourist phrase book. Time allowing, a brief overview of rural Latin American culture will be given. The participates should come ready to role play as the facilitator believes the best way to learn is by doing.

The workshop will start at 7:00PM August 9th, and be held at the Rockville library in a large upstairs room. Following the lesson, we will proceed to La Tasca for Spanish Tapas (appetizers), a brief meeting and networking. We hope to see you there.

We would appreciate knowing if you are coming so we can prepare enough materials. Please contact Paul Hlavinka (treasurer@chesapeakeewb.org) to confirm attendance.