food poisoning...

i guess it´s bound to hit when moving to any foreign country, but prior to wednesday i had been spared. the day started out with a "taller" on malnutrition. we were training community members on how to weigh and measure children under the age of two using an infantometro.

reading the scales proved to be understandably difficult for many of the participants, many of whom are iliterate or have a basic reading level. i worked with a woman named aurelia. she struggled with the scales, but i think she got it in the end (keeping my fingers crossed).

for lunch we headed to comedor rosalinda, and i got the caldo served with tomatillos. caldo basically is soup with a watery broth, usually cooked with meat and veggies (i gotta just remove the meat... it´s not always easy being a vegetarian in guatemala).

felt a little funny afterward, but my reaction did not start until later that night. if you´ve ever had food poisoning you understand. basically i spent about twentyfour hours over the toilet wanting to die. i felt pathetic and alone. i called up my mom just for sympathy points. i basically just needed someone else to feel sorry for me so that i wasn´t only feeling sorry for myself.

i´ll spare you all of the graphic details of the sickness. more difficult was just struggling with being sick, and not having anyone to take care of me. this is all part of the experience here. many volunteers told us prior to swearing in that dealing with the solitude and loneliness is the most difficult part. i have been in site so short that i havent yet developed a system of support that i can go to when i am struggling (or pissing out of my ass).

luckily i have a pretty awesome sitemate and she brought me some pan frances. i curled up on my mattress on the floor and slept it off best that i could.

too tall to play...

my friend dan, another PCV, sent me a text the other night asking if i would like to play in our towns basketball tournament. at first visions ran through my mind of my embarrassing performances on the basketball as a (very) uncoordinated adolescent. still, i thought, this may be a good opportunity to meet some new people.

i showed up at the court tuesday afternoon promptly at 3:30 ready to play. the other women showed up one by one. i approached the guy who appeared to be in charge and asked if i could be possibly placed on a team. he kinda mumbled something under his breath and told me to wait a few. i took a seat in the cement bleachers and watched the women gather and put on their uniforms. a few minuntes later someone came over to break me the bad news... i am too tall to play basketball, and i{m not on the list.

prior to this i saw my height being the only advantage i actually have on the court. apart from that i am an unaggressive, uncoordinated mess, still not completely sure what to do with my own limbs at times. ive gotten used to towering above pretty much every "chapin" (guatemalan) i meet and most of the time i just forget about my height.

i would have been sad about the news, but more than anything i just thought it was funny.... (hopefully theyll find a space for me on a team next season:-)

gracias...

yesterday was turkey day. i think the perception is that holidays are a really hard time to be away from home. so to try and avoid feeling sorry for myself i always opt to spend holidays away from home in a very unconventional way. this thanksgiving was no exception. myself along with twenty other recently sworn in volunteers got to share our pumpkin pie at the US ambassador´s house with him and his wife. they were very welcoming and the food was a nice treat. it was for sure a very (very) surreal day.

it started at about 2:00am. i woke up in my new place laying on a mattress on the floor (havent gotten hold of an actual bed yet...). i dragged myself to the busstop bleary eyed with my backpack in tote and a rock in my hand to ward off late night bolos (drunks) and chuchos (street dogs). i boarded the chicken bus (think of the big yellow things you used to ride to elementary school) and i was on my way. bus rides are full fledged sensory overload. despite it being the middle of the night the driver blared ranchero, probably trying to stay awake more than anything else. people are packkkkkkkked in. at one time there was five people in my seat, 3 adults and 2 children. not the most comfortable ride, but who can complain when you can do a 7 hour ride for 30 quetzales (about 4 dollars). i showed up at cuerpo de paz in a bit of a stupor and soon realized that i had forgotten to bring shoes. i had to wear green crocs to the ambassadors house... sorry mom.

we got there and it was beautiful. me and the other agriculture volunteers spent a good portion of our time scoping out the gardens which were amazingly gorgeous. we got to sip some fine wine, eat some traditional turkey and stuffing (at least the nonvegetarians - no they did not serve tofurkey), and swim in a heated pool. the highlight for sure was the pumpkin cheesecake. a nice change to have some comfort food from the states although ive developed a soft spot for pepian here.

paradox...

well the paradox here is pretty obvious. this is why i could never work for the state department. i understand the necessity of having this seperation between foreign service workers and the people (minus the really rich/powerful people typically) in country... i guess. the high walls, big gates and security guards. they´re all business, official, suit and tie, and their purpose in country is to promote the interests of the united states government. someones gotta do it. i´m just glad it´s not me in the tie.

to go from a congested bus in the poorest town in all of guatemala to a plush home in guate was a jolting experience. so much in this country, everything in this world is riddled with these paradoxes. thanksgiving was just a magnified, REALLY magnified, example of this.

it was a beautiful day.

both the bus ride at 2:00 am and the afternoon at the ambassadors house.

poco a poco...

so i started work last week as a full fledged volunteer (wooooohoooo!). let me be straight up... it was awesome, but it was hard as starting any new job is. it just happens that this new job is a little more intense, because of language barriers (havent quite mastered MAM yet), cultural differences ...and basically because i am not a guatemalan.

the organization i´m working for has been really successful from what ive seen at striking a good balance between serving the local community and serving the wants of international donating agencies. this typically means they´ve done a good job at doing studies of progress, and maintaining a certain level of transparency, a pretty spectacular feat in a country inundated with corruption

day 1 - i went to a workshop on gender. the organization has about 500 female members and only about 100 men. i personally see this as a huge plus, but they are trying to examine how to get men more involved. most men here wouldn´t be too enthused about getting involved in weaving projects here to say the least. finding ways to diversify projects so that men too could become involved was the basic focus of the day.

one of the great things about our organization has been its work with women. its a very empowering thing to see the work they are doing. the womens groups allow them to occupy the leadership roles they are typically denied in national and local politics.

day 2 - i built a house for potatoes. its an agriculture project a group of women is doing. the husbands tackled the labor while women did smaller tasks (carrying wood...). i contemplated taking up a hammer, but it was my first day and it was cool just to hang out with the women. they all spoke in MAM and when i first arrived i didnt even know if they spoke spanish. turns out they do! at least the younger women do. i got a lot of questions about the states (will you teach me english? how much does it cost to go to the states? how many dollars did your shoes cost?) which i tried...TRIED to artfully dodge with some degree of success. besides that, we spent a lot of time talking about family and boyfriends/esposos, and the projects they´ve been doing.

i felt shy and intimitated being the new woman, but it was a good day.

day 3 - workshop with coworkers on food security (hey! that´s my job here!). the secretary of "seguridad alimentaria" gave the talk and also some pretty disturbing stats about malnutrition in guatemala and our department. i´ll make sure to post them some time soon...

things are good, but it is for sure a process finding my place here... poco a poco.

i hope everyone had a wonderful thanksgiving stateside. much love.

p.s. i saw a pretty amazing movie narrated by rigoberta menchu about guatemala called "when the mountains tremble". definetely try and see it if you can get a hold of a copy.

chin gólben tey

after much anticipation i got to visit my site last week. my counterpart from the orranization i will be working with came to the peace corps training center for a little orientation session and then we were on our way. i am lucky it is beautiful. temperate climate, pine trees, and mountains.

talking to volunteers it typically seems that both their counterparts and the organizations they work for vary greatly in size and organization. some are working for multimillion dollar international NGO´s while others work for small community based organizations. i am relieved that my organization is locally centered and employs people from the community that speak the language (...apart from myself). even though they are relatively small they still appear very well organized and that they have a lot of passion for the work they do in the field of development.

it also seems like anything i´m interested in doing they would be down with. nutrition, appropriate technology, family gardens, education projects, reforestation... as long as it seems like a healthy step in the right direction they seemed enthused.

i also found a new home (my first own place...sorta). i was lucky to find something really easily. i will be moving into the home of a peace vorps volunteer who is finishing her service right now. pictures will be incoming... as long as i have space for a garden, i´m happy.

i swear to...

the big day arrived. yesterday we got dressed up in all our finery, went to the home of the us ambassador and officially became peace corps volunteers. i think ive been anticipating becoming a volunteer since high school or before. its very crazy to be here now. surreal at times.

all of us got to bring members of our host families and that was really great to share the day with them. i think living with them has been the best part of my service so far. i am overwhelmed by their warmth, kindness, and quick wit. the night before the ceremony they surprised me with the traditional apron that the women in their community wear. i was so excited and proud to wear it.

ladrones...!

yesterday turned out to be a not so bueno day. me and jose hiked to our little garden with our host brother Frenel. the game plan was to transplant some brocolli and harvest some big juicy rabanos (radishes).

we walked down the small hill approaching our garden and...... devestation. all of our radishes were gone. and it wasn't because some chicken or insect chomped down on them. someone or (somebodies) stole them. i think having something stolen is one of the worst feelings in the world. even if the something stolen has little or no value (i.e. rabanos) it is just the feeling of being in some way violated.

what strikes me more however is how sad it is that somebody would actually steal vegetables either for their own consumption or to sell at market. My host grandmother said that this is actually a fairly common occurence. my little host brother said he would start guarding our garden for us. definetely appreciate the sentiment, but he's nine and his best weapon is a rock he sometimes totes around. it's a really big rock, though:-)

asi es la vida.

the rest of the day went fine. we transplanted, and i helped dona marta shuck some black beans (we've shifted from shucking green beans to black beans).