Before I start in on this blog post, I’d just like to make a public acknowledgement to my absolutely fantastic mother. In speaking with my parents I’ve complained many times about the dreary nature of the food here; rice, beans and tortillas every single meal. Every once in a while the type of beans changes, or the shape of the tortillas, and sometimes there’s a tangy sort of cream cheese added, or perhaps watery-ketchup like tomato sauce, the intermittent treat of bone chunks or cow gut, but variation is minimal. In a loving mark of solidarity with my culinary plight, my darling mom has taken on a week-long diet of rice and beans, three meals a day. That, ladies and gents, is a sacrifice. I know better than anyone else. If you don’t quite understand why I’m making such a big deal about this, it’s because you haven’t lived it. Long story short: thanks, Nanc. It means a lot to me!
An announcement was made in school yesterday that the father of one of our secretaries, and the father-in-law of our school director, had passed away. An elderly man, he’d apparently had a heart attack. In an effort to express support on the part of the school, we were invited to attend the funeral service this morning (Friday). Since I had absolutely nothing else to do, and I’ve been going out of my mind sitting in my room and twiddling my thumbs, I agreed to go. Funerals are never exactly a fun affair, but anything is better than sitting here bored, and I was a bit curious about the customs and services.
Around 9 am a contingent of teachers and students set out on a footpath through the overgrown hills. The funeral was taking place in nearby Samac, a short 15 minute hike away. We crossed over several hills, forded a creek and finally emerged from the jungle onto a muddy road leading into town. A small village, it was easy to find the funeral party: every single resident was there.
A large crowd had gathered around a small, ancient wood barn, from which marimba music and scented smoked drifted out. We slowly made our way through the mass, eventually reaching the barn’s entrance. I wasn’t exactly sure where we were going or what we would do once we got there; I simply followed my leaders like any good little soldier of goodwill. Among the group of people which we’d pressed through there were plenty of calm, contented faces, and the outer fringes had an unmistakable conversational atmosphere. Some people had apparently shown up just for the purpose of a social gathering (not unlike myself). Tear-stained faces and puffy eyes were present too, of course, as were seemingly hundreds of children. Ranging in stature from knee- to mid-thigh height, they skittered through the people, giggling and knocking into the forest of legs above them.
Inside the narrow, low-roofed barn the coffin sat on a raised platform of cinderblocks. The dirt floor was scattered with fallen flower petals and discarded incense wood. Plastic chairs were squeezed into rows on the coffin’s sides, and the marimba was set up in the back plunking out cheery percussions. (The marimba is sort of like a table-xylophone, made with wooden blocks. It’s about four and a half feet long, stands at waist height, and is played by three people at once, drumming out choreographed rhythms with rubber-headed mallets.)
The family circulated in and out of the room, as did spectators like us. I felt terribly out of place, but I couldn’t see how these other teachers or students could feel much more entitled to be there than I, so I didn’t fret it too much. When we first walked in I was appalled to see one of the teachers who had arrived before us leaning back in a chair, casually munching a hunk of bread and sipping from a coffee mug. Although this environment of reverence and sorrow hardly seemed like an appropriate place for such frivolities in my opinion, I was clearly in the minority. I was ushered to a front-row seat, where I suppose my job was to reflect on the years of friendship which had passed between myself and, uh, whatshisname. After I’d been there for just a few moments one of the gentleman’s sons, the one who works at the school, came around offering all of our group room-temperature sodas. Not particularly wanting one, but also not sure what to do, I followed the examples of those around me and accepted. Apparently refreshments are an expected part of the process here.
We sat in the room for several minutes. The heat of so many bodies, amplified by thick incense smoke circulating from a pot at the foot of the coffin, began to make me uncomfortable, and was glad that I’d taken a soda. Unfortunately, no one else had opened theirs yet, and as I was unsure of the proper protocol mine remained tempting and unopened in my lap for several slowly dragging minutes.
Finally my colleagues started snapping the tops of their Pepsis, and I did the same. Not being much of a regular pop drinker, the sickly sweet syrup of Orange Soda nearly made me ill, and instead of being refreshed I was disgusted. Unsure of what exactly I was doing there, if I was behaving correctly or not, and how much longer I’d be in that suffocating environment was a bit purgatorial in nature. The heavy feeling which straight sucrose imparted on my stomach and the slime forming on my teeth as sugar coated the enamel didn’t exactly help.
Suddenly the woman I’d been sitting with throughout all of this clutched my arm, said “Let’s have a look, shall we?” and drug me up to the coffin’s side. A viewing window had been propped open, and we peered in, finding a body completely shrouded in blankets. There was absolutely nothing to see, but she meditated over it for several minutes, holding me with her all the while. Another teacher at La Asunción, I honestly don’t even think this woman had ever met our deceased friend, but apparently that was the reverent thing to do, so I did the same.
We sat back down after a bit, and then eventually left for the “fresh” air formed in the throng of people outside. Eventually the coffin was carried out of its catacombic barn and was carried down the street. The crowed processed behind, filing into the local coffee cooperative building, where we listened to an hour’s worth of eulogizing. I’d love to spend a moment telling about the life this man led, the family he loved, and the interesting things he did, but I’m afraid it was all in Ki’chee’. Your guess is as good as mine.
Eventually, we all packed up and moved down the road again, this time to the cemetery. The road was filled with the vibrant colors of the women’s traditional costumes; the majority of their outfits including babies tied on their backs. I would guess that several hundred people were present, filling the road completely and stretching on for yards. The marimba was actually carried behind the coffin by three men, who held it above the ground while the musicians continued playing. The entire ambiance was an eerie, juxtaposed combination of cheery vibrancy and somberly funereal.
The coffin was interred, laboriously lowered into the earth while family members wailed with heartbreaking passion and no less than three ice-cream cart men peddled their sustenance to the amassed crowd of onlookers. Our small band of teachers retreated down the hill, returning to our haven of La Asunción.
While at this funeral I learned that a young boy from Santo Tomas also died recently, and funeral services will be taking place tonight. It’s a much, much sadder story. He’s the nephew of one of the clinic workers, and was ten years old. We actually saw the clinic employee rushing to the national hospital on Sunday evening, going to pick up his nephew and take him to a better, private institution. Apparently the boy had been running around during recess at school, and had collided with another student. His nose had been broken, and it was all treated very normally. However, he kept getting sicker and sicker, broke with an astronomical fever, and died less than a week after it had happened. Rumor has it that he broke a vessel behind his eye, and it went unnoticed and undiagnosed. Either an infection or a stroke eventually killed him. Ten years old.
I’m planning on going down to Santo Tomas this weekend, and I’m afraid I’ll end up attending the service. He was Catholic, and had many times to the clinic and the school, so I imagine it’s inevitable. I’m not looking forward to it; I imagine I’ll cry as hard as the rest. A lack of good medical technology is probably what ended his life; that’s “fuerte,” as my Chilean brother Felipe would say. “Heavy,” I guess, would be the best translation.
Friday, June 27, 2008
Thursday, June 26, 2008
Teacher's Day Continued...
Well, if there’s anything they know how to do here, it’s celebrate themselves.
I know I mentioned that last Friday they had a “National Teacher’s Day” celebration which lasted the entire morning. It nearly ended up causing the cancelation of classes, actually. However, it was an outdoor affair, and the customary early afternoon torrential downpour put an end to the festivities.
Although you or I would probably consider the fanfare-filled party on Friday sufficient in celebrating the profession, that’s clearly not the Guatemalan way. I left Xejuyup and enjoyed a wonderful, restful weekend away from teaching, anticipating Monday’s abrubt return to the daily grind.
The day certainly started as any normal day would, with the first set of classes as usual. However, I was soon made aware of a Teacher Appreciation event which would be going on at 5 pm, overlapping with my last two classes. Not feeling particularly inclined to battle for classroom time, I acquiesced, and arrived in the library as requested at 5.
The celebratory affair ended up being in many ways simply a smaller-scale version of Friday’s event. Students read short, silly, relatively tacky poems about how their teachers have done magnanimous things like change the course of lives and inspire greatness beyond our wildest imaginations. There were “concoursos,” which I’ve quickly learned is the name for goofy little competitions like chugging sodas or pantomiming animals for everyone to guess. Of course, prizes aplenty were awarded. I myself am the lucky new owner of a shiny pink and blue umbrella. We were fed dinner, serenaded, applauded, awarded gift certificates, lauded for our greatness and occupied for approximately three and a half hours.
Well, I thought, as the festivities wrapped up, that was a decent way to fill a large chunk of time, I suppose. I don’t know what else I would have been doing, so this works. Additionally, we were given little cards from the administration inviting us to another little party the next day at 2 pm. Nice! Missing more classes!
I went to my room and worked on some class plans for the next day and medical school application stuff for the next few hours. I wanted to make some progress, so I closed my curtains and my door, an act which generally prevents a significant number of drop-in visitors which otherwise occupy all of my time in the evenings.
Not until around 10 pm did anyone come knocking, and by then I was more than happy to welcome another person into my little hermitsville. It was one of the girls, coming by to say hi, of course. “Aren’t you glad we don’t have any class tomorrow or Wednesday?” she asked me. This was the first I’d heard of it, and I told her as much. It turns out class had been surprise suspended as a gift to the teachers, in appreciation of all of our hard work. You think they’d have explained that to us at our gathering a few hours earlier, but somehow it must have gotten lost in the details. Strange.
I spent the next morning writing and reading (I finished my third book since I’ve gotten down here this morning. The Hot Zone, by Richard Preston. It’s a winner; if the whole medical school thing doesn’t work out and I don’t fall in love with yelling at little brats all day I think my next fall back is becoming a virus hunter in the African jungles. Probably the coolest job God ever allowed anyone to invent. Anything cooler he’d probably be threatened by – people would just start to worship this new position; that’s how sweet virus hunting is.).
I also washed my clothes in the “washing machine” for the first time since I got here. If you’re wondering why I put washing machine in quotations, allow me to explain. If you saw what I’m referring to without any accompanying explanation, you’d probably call it a concrete tub. That’s what the uncreative mind sees, anyways. Apparently, Guatemalans, and now me, see clean clothes. It’s a bit of a challenge figuring out a good system of lathering and rinsing when you’re working with a stagnant pool of water, but I assure you it can be done. In all honesty, it doesn’t really bother me to hand wash my laundry. Well, let me clarify. It doesn’t bother me until Ricky brings up the fact that he has a maid and laundry service which regularly scrubs every surface of his dorm room and delivers fresh, folded laundry at his bidding. Then I start to feel like maybe I’m getting gypped.
I went to lunch at noon, where I was offered a watery pool of whole pinto beans garnished with a cow hoof. I turned down the hoof.
At 2 pm, I went down to the classroom where the little teacher’s party was held. They had set out trays of tostadas with beans and some sort of mystery pate, along with fresh squeezed orange juice and bowls brimming with fresh cut fruit. We spent another several hours talking about how awesome we are, listening to inspirational songs, and playing the sorts of games which we would usually reserve for sugar-fed kindergarteners. Considering the fact that we were all adults, I felt a bit foolish, but apparently asking grown adults to choreograph dances to corny songs and improvise poems with interpretive motions are pretty ageless activities around here.
I make fun, but I have to admit, I did have a good time, at first. It may have been silly, but it’s hard to be judgmental when everyone is clearly having a good time. The truth is, this is the most feel-good-Dr-Phil-Chicken-Soup-For-The-Soul group of people I’ve ever been around. We’re constantly being given microphones and everyone’s attention in order to express “How we feel,” and part of the festivities today included hugging every single person in the room and wishing them a Feliz Dia del Maestro. Lordy. I hadn’t even met 80% of them! Of course, one of the mottos of the SoCo Crew has always been “Handshakes are for strangers. Friends give hugs!,” so I didn’t mind.
Although I was already full from essentially eating two lunches, after we’d been there for a while they brought out a whole new feast of barbequed shrimp, chips and fresh homemade guacamole and delicious burning hot chili sauce. Despite being fully satiated, I dug in with delight, never one to turn down shellfish. (That’s probably a really dangerous characteristic, now that I think about it. Maybe I should work on that.) Remarkably, my plate was heaped with such an Everest of shiny pink shells that I was unable to finish it. (I did, however, squeeze in some space for an ice cream cone once I’d licked the shrimp goo off my fingers. I don’t know what I’m going to do for garb once I, err, outgrow everything I brought with me!)
All said, the whole production lasted well over 4 hours, full of feasting and repetitive praise to our little core of dedicated educators. I have to confess to feeling a bit like Whoopie Goldberg in Sister Act. I may look like a teacher, but I sure don’t feel like one yet!
I retired to my room stuffed to the point of being uncomf-ter-full, and feeling slightly trapped. I was dying to do something physically active after a day of such gluttony, but I really can’t go anywhere alone and didn’t have any idea where I could go even if I could find a comrade in exercise. When I heard a bouncing ball outside my room, I jumped up and found its owner. There’s a pretty decent basketball court here at the school, so I went and shot around by myself for about a half an hour before being joined by some of the girls. Being the ever educating spirit that I am, I can now proudly announce that three more people in the world know how to spell H-O-R-S-E now. Too bad I lost.
I know I mentioned that last Friday they had a “National Teacher’s Day” celebration which lasted the entire morning. It nearly ended up causing the cancelation of classes, actually. However, it was an outdoor affair, and the customary early afternoon torrential downpour put an end to the festivities.
Although you or I would probably consider the fanfare-filled party on Friday sufficient in celebrating the profession, that’s clearly not the Guatemalan way. I left Xejuyup and enjoyed a wonderful, restful weekend away from teaching, anticipating Monday’s abrubt return to the daily grind.
The day certainly started as any normal day would, with the first set of classes as usual. However, I was soon made aware of a Teacher Appreciation event which would be going on at 5 pm, overlapping with my last two classes. Not feeling particularly inclined to battle for classroom time, I acquiesced, and arrived in the library as requested at 5.
The celebratory affair ended up being in many ways simply a smaller-scale version of Friday’s event. Students read short, silly, relatively tacky poems about how their teachers have done magnanimous things like change the course of lives and inspire greatness beyond our wildest imaginations. There were “concoursos,” which I’ve quickly learned is the name for goofy little competitions like chugging sodas or pantomiming animals for everyone to guess. Of course, prizes aplenty were awarded. I myself am the lucky new owner of a shiny pink and blue umbrella. We were fed dinner, serenaded, applauded, awarded gift certificates, lauded for our greatness and occupied for approximately three and a half hours.
Well, I thought, as the festivities wrapped up, that was a decent way to fill a large chunk of time, I suppose. I don’t know what else I would have been doing, so this works. Additionally, we were given little cards from the administration inviting us to another little party the next day at 2 pm. Nice! Missing more classes!
I went to my room and worked on some class plans for the next day and medical school application stuff for the next few hours. I wanted to make some progress, so I closed my curtains and my door, an act which generally prevents a significant number of drop-in visitors which otherwise occupy all of my time in the evenings.
Not until around 10 pm did anyone come knocking, and by then I was more than happy to welcome another person into my little hermitsville. It was one of the girls, coming by to say hi, of course. “Aren’t you glad we don’t have any class tomorrow or Wednesday?” she asked me. This was the first I’d heard of it, and I told her as much. It turns out class had been surprise suspended as a gift to the teachers, in appreciation of all of our hard work. You think they’d have explained that to us at our gathering a few hours earlier, but somehow it must have gotten lost in the details. Strange.
I spent the next morning writing and reading (I finished my third book since I’ve gotten down here this morning. The Hot Zone, by Richard Preston. It’s a winner; if the whole medical school thing doesn’t work out and I don’t fall in love with yelling at little brats all day I think my next fall back is becoming a virus hunter in the African jungles. Probably the coolest job God ever allowed anyone to invent. Anything cooler he’d probably be threatened by – people would just start to worship this new position; that’s how sweet virus hunting is.).
I also washed my clothes in the “washing machine” for the first time since I got here. If you’re wondering why I put washing machine in quotations, allow me to explain. If you saw what I’m referring to without any accompanying explanation, you’d probably call it a concrete tub. That’s what the uncreative mind sees, anyways. Apparently, Guatemalans, and now me, see clean clothes. It’s a bit of a challenge figuring out a good system of lathering and rinsing when you’re working with a stagnant pool of water, but I assure you it can be done. In all honesty, it doesn’t really bother me to hand wash my laundry. Well, let me clarify. It doesn’t bother me until Ricky brings up the fact that he has a maid and laundry service which regularly scrubs every surface of his dorm room and delivers fresh, folded laundry at his bidding. Then I start to feel like maybe I’m getting gypped.
I went to lunch at noon, where I was offered a watery pool of whole pinto beans garnished with a cow hoof. I turned down the hoof.
At 2 pm, I went down to the classroom where the little teacher’s party was held. They had set out trays of tostadas with beans and some sort of mystery pate, along with fresh squeezed orange juice and bowls brimming with fresh cut fruit. We spent another several hours talking about how awesome we are, listening to inspirational songs, and playing the sorts of games which we would usually reserve for sugar-fed kindergarteners. Considering the fact that we were all adults, I felt a bit foolish, but apparently asking grown adults to choreograph dances to corny songs and improvise poems with interpretive motions are pretty ageless activities around here.
I make fun, but I have to admit, I did have a good time, at first. It may have been silly, but it’s hard to be judgmental when everyone is clearly having a good time. The truth is, this is the most feel-good-Dr-Phil-Chicken-Soup-For-The-Soul group of people I’ve ever been around. We’re constantly being given microphones and everyone’s attention in order to express “How we feel,” and part of the festivities today included hugging every single person in the room and wishing them a Feliz Dia del Maestro. Lordy. I hadn’t even met 80% of them! Of course, one of the mottos of the SoCo Crew has always been “Handshakes are for strangers. Friends give hugs!,” so I didn’t mind.
Although I was already full from essentially eating two lunches, after we’d been there for a while they brought out a whole new feast of barbequed shrimp, chips and fresh homemade guacamole and delicious burning hot chili sauce. Despite being fully satiated, I dug in with delight, never one to turn down shellfish. (That’s probably a really dangerous characteristic, now that I think about it. Maybe I should work on that.) Remarkably, my plate was heaped with such an Everest of shiny pink shells that I was unable to finish it. (I did, however, squeeze in some space for an ice cream cone once I’d licked the shrimp goo off my fingers. I don’t know what I’m going to do for garb once I, err, outgrow everything I brought with me!)
All said, the whole production lasted well over 4 hours, full of feasting and repetitive praise to our little core of dedicated educators. I have to confess to feeling a bit like Whoopie Goldberg in Sister Act. I may look like a teacher, but I sure don’t feel like one yet!
I retired to my room stuffed to the point of being uncomf-ter-full, and feeling slightly trapped. I was dying to do something physically active after a day of such gluttony, but I really can’t go anywhere alone and didn’t have any idea where I could go even if I could find a comrade in exercise. When I heard a bouncing ball outside my room, I jumped up and found its owner. There’s a pretty decent basketball court here at the school, so I went and shot around by myself for about a half an hour before being joined by some of the girls. Being the ever educating spirit that I am, I can now proudly announce that three more people in the world know how to spell H-O-R-S-E now. Too bad I lost.
Monday, June 23, 2008
Saturday, June 21st
First and foremost – Happy Birthday, Zach!! I know that you won’t see this on your birthday, but I did remember it, and I wanted to wish you a good one. I actually was planning on calling you, but forgot the notebook with your phone number recorded in it up at the school.
This weekend has brought a very welcome break from the occasionally tiresome environment of the school. I know, I know, I’ve only been there for a week, but I swear, it’s an atmosphere which requires my energy 24/7! I mean that literally! On Wednesday, for example, I was awake in bed for hours into then night, listening to the maintenance man banging and clanging on pipes, trying to fix the plumbing which had ceased to function earlier in the day. Resolving my forced insomnia with the thought of a brisk pick-me-up shower in the morning, I endured it. Sadly, upon arising at 6 am on Thursday, I was greeted by ineffective faucets once more.
Sheila had already suggested that I come down to Santo Tomas after my classes finished on Friday, and I was looking forward to it. I’ve only got 3 classes to teach on Fridays, and they get over around 3. I was planning on scooting out while it was still light out (it gets dark pretty early.) Instead, I was pressed into service stuffing and addressing envelopes, translating letters, and coordinating efforts for mailings to student sponsors at home. For four hours. While rain pounded down on the tin roof overhead. And the electricity functioned only intermittently. All while enduring a pounding headache. (The headache was a pre-existing condition, exacerbated by the circumstances. All combined, it didn’t exactly bring out the best in me.)
Finally, Sheila called around 7 to see where I was, and why I hadn’t gotten to the clinic yet (she thought my classes got out at 6.) I was very grateful, since it had already gotten dark, I was hungry, and above all I was sick of being there feeling cranky. (I’m pretty certain that Sheila’s an angel. She’s a sometimes-rum-drinking, reckless-driving, occasionally oblivious to her surroundings, Butte-born angel, but a halo’s a halo.)
She picked me up –despite endearing protests from the girls – and took me to town. Two couples representing the Libby, Montana Rotary International Club are here this week, setting up plans for a rural water distribution system. We all ate dinner together, I had a delightful time. They’re all very interesting, engaging, intelligent, and fun, and it was great to interact with them casually and freely after a week of being “profé.”
Sheila’s taken us all to Lago Atitlán today (Saturday), where I’m writing this now. We’ve spent the day here, taking in the sights, wandering the craft markets, visiting the lake, and enjoying great food and wonderful company. The weather has been perfect – none of the 1:30-8 pm torrential rains I’ve seen every day at the school thus far. We went to a beautiful mass with a great band in a fabulous old church, and enjoyed appetizers and drinks along the lakeside. (Margarita, anyone? How about a Mojito? I may or may not have had both.) (Author’s Note: The “not” in that last sentence is pronounced like the “p” in pterodactyl.)
All in all, it’s been a far cry from the Guatemala I’ve seen thus far. I’m already well aware that the “best foot forward” tourist venues of Latin America are no more than a façade, but I can’t help enjoying it a bit.
In all honesty, though, this “tiempo turistica” has really just helped me to value what I’m doing here all the more. Yes, this is all very nice and likeable, but it’s NOT Guatemala. If I traveled to all of the nation’s “hot spots” of tourist interest for an entire month, it would be totally possible to leave here without every understanding how literally over 95% of the population lives. As it is, my spot at the school, sparse as it may be by our standards, is actually luxury. This, in Panahachel (the town we’re staying in), is ultra-high class, and, ultimately, empty. It doesn’t show anything about the people or the country, or the way of life.
All in all, I’ve enjoyed this on multiple levels. The company has been great, the getaway is a relaxing break from the school, and I’ve been made just a bit more aware of the real value of what I’m doing here.
It was easy before I left to imagine this as a year full of days like today. Of course, I knew better all along, but why not imagine relaxation and ease? Really, my reason for being here is service to the poor. That’s what it’s always been about, since Father Hazelton came and spoke to my class early in the fall semester, and inspired me to seek a position here. Once I make an active point to bring that thought to the foreground, little sacrifices like cold showers and being lonely for easy communication are much more bearable. All said, a highly productive day.
PS: I finally figured out my phone number, if anyone (Mom, Dad…) is interested in trying to call me with a phone card.
The country code (I believe) is 502, and my number is 580 68 993. I’m not sure why, but I believe the series of numbers you’d need to dial would be 011 – 502 – 580 – 68 – 993. Maybe try googling “calling Guatemala” or “Guat
This weekend has brought a very welcome break from the occasionally tiresome environment of the school. I know, I know, I’ve only been there for a week, but I swear, it’s an atmosphere which requires my energy 24/7! I mean that literally! On Wednesday, for example, I was awake in bed for hours into then night, listening to the maintenance man banging and clanging on pipes, trying to fix the plumbing which had ceased to function earlier in the day. Resolving my forced insomnia with the thought of a brisk pick-me-up shower in the morning, I endured it. Sadly, upon arising at 6 am on Thursday, I was greeted by ineffective faucets once more.
Sheila had already suggested that I come down to Santo Tomas after my classes finished on Friday, and I was looking forward to it. I’ve only got 3 classes to teach on Fridays, and they get over around 3. I was planning on scooting out while it was still light out (it gets dark pretty early.) Instead, I was pressed into service stuffing and addressing envelopes, translating letters, and coordinating efforts for mailings to student sponsors at home. For four hours. While rain pounded down on the tin roof overhead. And the electricity functioned only intermittently. All while enduring a pounding headache. (The headache was a pre-existing condition, exacerbated by the circumstances. All combined, it didn’t exactly bring out the best in me.)
Finally, Sheila called around 7 to see where I was, and why I hadn’t gotten to the clinic yet (she thought my classes got out at 6.) I was very grateful, since it had already gotten dark, I was hungry, and above all I was sick of being there feeling cranky. (I’m pretty certain that Sheila’s an angel. She’s a sometimes-rum-drinking, reckless-driving, occasionally oblivious to her surroundings, Butte-born angel, but a halo’s a halo.)
She picked me up –despite endearing protests from the girls – and took me to town. Two couples representing the Libby, Montana Rotary International Club are here this week, setting up plans for a rural water distribution system. We all ate dinner together, I had a delightful time. They’re all very interesting, engaging, intelligent, and fun, and it was great to interact with them casually and freely after a week of being “profé.”
Sheila’s taken us all to Lago Atitlán today (Saturday), where I’m writing this now. We’ve spent the day here, taking in the sights, wandering the craft markets, visiting the lake, and enjoying great food and wonderful company. The weather has been perfect – none of the 1:30-8 pm torrential rains I’ve seen every day at the school thus far. We went to a beautiful mass with a great band in a fabulous old church, and enjoyed appetizers and drinks along the lakeside. (Margarita, anyone? How about a Mojito? I may or may not have had both.) (Author’s Note: The “not” in that last sentence is pronounced like the “p” in pterodactyl.)
All in all, it’s been a far cry from the Guatemala I’ve seen thus far. I’m already well aware that the “best foot forward” tourist venues of Latin America are no more than a façade, but I can’t help enjoying it a bit.
In all honesty, though, this “tiempo turistica” has really just helped me to value what I’m doing here all the more. Yes, this is all very nice and likeable, but it’s NOT Guatemala. If I traveled to all of the nation’s “hot spots” of tourist interest for an entire month, it would be totally possible to leave here without every understanding how literally over 95% of the population lives. As it is, my spot at the school, sparse as it may be by our standards, is actually luxury. This, in Panahachel (the town we’re staying in), is ultra-high class, and, ultimately, empty. It doesn’t show anything about the people or the country, or the way of life.
All in all, I’ve enjoyed this on multiple levels. The company has been great, the getaway is a relaxing break from the school, and I’ve been made just a bit more aware of the real value of what I’m doing here.
It was easy before I left to imagine this as a year full of days like today. Of course, I knew better all along, but why not imagine relaxation and ease? Really, my reason for being here is service to the poor. That’s what it’s always been about, since Father Hazelton came and spoke to my class early in the fall semester, and inspired me to seek a position here. Once I make an active point to bring that thought to the foreground, little sacrifices like cold showers and being lonely for easy communication are much more bearable. All said, a highly productive day.
PS: I finally figured out my phone number, if anyone (Mom, Dad…) is interested in trying to call me with a phone card.
The country code (I believe) is 502, and my number is 580 68 993. I’m not sure why, but I believe the series of numbers you’d need to dial would be 011 – 502 – 580 – 68 – 993. Maybe try googling “calling Guatemala” or “Guat
Friday Fun
Oh boy. It’s just a little past noon, and my day has already been all kinds of silly.
Today is some sort of national teacher’s day, and all of the teachers from the region have come to Xejuyup for a big celebration. No one seemed particularly capable of explaining the whole festivity up until today; everyone claimed to be in the dark with regards to the time, and what would be happening, and where it would be taking place. Then, around 8:30 this morning, the school director came knocking on my door (I was fresh out of my icy shower…probably still shivering). He explained to me that the reason for today’s celebration was to honor all teachers, and that there would be a variety of cultural events taking place along with the coronation of some sort of regional queen of education. Uh, ok.
Of course, all of this was done with the very wordy, round-about, pomp-and-circumstance manner in which formal conversations take place here. I could tell he was trying to get to some sort of a point, and by the time he got around to mentioning the fact that all of the teachers from our school would be dancing a typical Guatemalan dance, I wasn’t surprised. However, when he suggested that I, also, should be taking part, I was a bit taken aback. They’ve been talking about this event (albeit in frustratingly vague terms) for the whole week. No one could have mentioned the fact to me that I would be expected to dance in front of a crowd of several hundred teachers? And perhaps taken a second to teach me the dance steps?
I think my hesitation to participate must have been obvious, and the director mercifully let me off the hook this time. Next time, it probably won’t be so easy.
Don’t get me wrong; I’m all about new cultural experiences, and trying to learn about the typical customs and traditions here. But dancing in front of a crowd of several hundred adults, with only a half an hour of forewarning? Let’s be reasonable.
I went down to the town center along with Manuela, who is basically the head coordinator of the boarding program. She’s a very nice girl, if not a bit space cadet-y, and quite long-winded when given a microphone. But other than that, delightful. We got all the way to the town center (it’s not that far, but I say “all of the way” because we had, I kid you not, five false starts. We left her room and got various distances towards the center before she realized she’d forgotten something FIVE times.) Once we sat down and looked around, she said “Aye! We should have put you in a traje typica! (traditional dress.)”
So….back up the hill we went again, and she found me a traje typica to put on. The outfit that nearly all of the women here wear is a standard style, with different regions of the country adopting variations in pattern and color. The tops are called huipuils, and they are kind of bag-with-sleeves shaped giant heavy cotton shirts which are tucked in and bloused out over the skirt. They are pretty much always appliquéd or woven with some sort of brightly colored design, and are usually very pretty.
The skirt is basically a giant cloth tube which, when held out, could easily fit five people inside. It’s wrapped around your body several times, and covers from the waist to the ankles. It’s all held on to the body by simply tightly wrapping a woven or beaded belt around the waist several times, securing it by tucking in the belt edges.
They look, in a strange sort of way, like latino kimonos. They certainly require the wearer relatively small steps, and the give the body a very uniform shape, which only changes when it widens at the shoulders. I’ll try and post a picture once I get some good batteries for my camera. I’ve tried to buy some here, because I forgot to pack the ones I had at home, but they sell them already used and dead. It’s a pain.
Anyway, I felt like a silly, hot, bound-up fool in the outfit. As they were putting it on me, everyone around was delightfully chatting away in k’ichee’, and the only word I was consistently picking out sounded like “ooh-t.” I became convinced that “ooh-t” must mean something along the lines of “outlandish” or “absurd,” since that’s how I felt. Finally, I mustered up the courage to ask. Turns out, ladies and gents, that “Ut” means “Guapa,” which, for you non-Espanolites, is the feminine version of the word “handsome.”
I still wasn’t entirely convinced that I looked alright, but they were, so I just nodded and smiled and went along with it. It’s funny, because for the most part, I feel like no matter what I do I’m going to stand out here. I’m not going to normally wear Guatemalan outfits, and if I do, I’m so much taller than everyone else, and my hair is obviously a far cry from long and jet black. I’m noticeable no matter what. Although that should probably encourage me to take extra care of my appearance, instead, it’s kind of made me not care. I’m not going to conform, even if I want to, so I may as well be comfortable. Besides, I don’t have a mirror, so I don’t really ever know what I look like. Eh. Whatever.
Anyhow, we headed towards the town center (again) and I continued to receive compliments and stares. I even was whistled at a few times, which is the first time I’ve heard that happen at all since I’ve been here. Not only that, but once we finally got back to our seats at the festival, I even caught another upper-twenties aged teacher taking secret pictures of me. Turns out, I’m a babe in Guatemalan clothes. Sweet.
Of course, I almost blew my cover when I bent over in my seat to pick up a piece of paper which had fallen, and nearly toppled myself. I’d forgotten that I was bound up like a baby in bunting, and was expecting a bit more mobility. Luckily I caught myself in time; disaster averted.
After I got tired of sitting around at the presentation (as I write this it has been going on for 4 hours, with no signs of slowing, and so far it’s just been people standing on a stage and talking about how great teachers are) I headed back to the school, wanting to make it in time for lunch.
This is the second part of my day being ridiculous.
As always, I pushed my bowl through the little pass-through into the kitchen, the cooks took it, dished me up, and handed it back. I got my tortillas from the tortilla-distributor lady at the end of the line, and went to sit down. As I believe I’ve emphasized before, pretty much the only thing we eat here is rice, beans and tortillas. Today, however, we were in for a treat.
An orangy-red sauce sloshed around in the bottom of my shallow bowl, causing the few cooked potatoes and little slice of – meat? – to slide into one another. As I sat down, I timidly sniffed the dish, only to discover an odor reminiscent of barnyard bovine autopsies. Hm. That’s odd. The thin piece of meat was a rectangle a few inches long, with a smooth, connective tissue backing and a rough microvillus top. Although I inquired amongst my companions what this dish might be, they only giggled shyly and shrugged their shoulders. Odd.
I tried to eat a few of the potatoes, but couldn’t quite hack it. Everything had a sickening, rotten, dead smell to it. The girls around me were tearing into theirs with gusto, but anyone who’s heard me tell about Peruvian cuy knows I’ve learned my lesson with unknown, exotic foods.
I finished my tortillas in silence, wondering what vile ingredients this potion in front of me could possibly be concocted from. It didn’t take much deliberation for me to come to the obvious conclusion. I am, after all, a student of biology. This was clearly cow stomach soup. My suspicions were confirmed upon a more detailed quizzing of the girls. No one had wanted to tell me, for fear of my disgusted reaction, but Sherlock Jenna figured it out.
I passed my bowl down the table, letting someone else enjoy this culinary gem, and retired to my room to eat a sweet roll I’d purchased yesterday. Much safer, thank you very much.
Today is some sort of national teacher’s day, and all of the teachers from the region have come to Xejuyup for a big celebration. No one seemed particularly capable of explaining the whole festivity up until today; everyone claimed to be in the dark with regards to the time, and what would be happening, and where it would be taking place. Then, around 8:30 this morning, the school director came knocking on my door (I was fresh out of my icy shower…probably still shivering). He explained to me that the reason for today’s celebration was to honor all teachers, and that there would be a variety of cultural events taking place along with the coronation of some sort of regional queen of education. Uh, ok.
Of course, all of this was done with the very wordy, round-about, pomp-and-circumstance manner in which formal conversations take place here. I could tell he was trying to get to some sort of a point, and by the time he got around to mentioning the fact that all of the teachers from our school would be dancing a typical Guatemalan dance, I wasn’t surprised. However, when he suggested that I, also, should be taking part, I was a bit taken aback. They’ve been talking about this event (albeit in frustratingly vague terms) for the whole week. No one could have mentioned the fact to me that I would be expected to dance in front of a crowd of several hundred teachers? And perhaps taken a second to teach me the dance steps?
I think my hesitation to participate must have been obvious, and the director mercifully let me off the hook this time. Next time, it probably won’t be so easy.
Don’t get me wrong; I’m all about new cultural experiences, and trying to learn about the typical customs and traditions here. But dancing in front of a crowd of several hundred adults, with only a half an hour of forewarning? Let’s be reasonable.
I went down to the town center along with Manuela, who is basically the head coordinator of the boarding program. She’s a very nice girl, if not a bit space cadet-y, and quite long-winded when given a microphone. But other than that, delightful. We got all the way to the town center (it’s not that far, but I say “all of the way” because we had, I kid you not, five false starts. We left her room and got various distances towards the center before she realized she’d forgotten something FIVE times.) Once we sat down and looked around, she said “Aye! We should have put you in a traje typica! (traditional dress.)”
So….back up the hill we went again, and she found me a traje typica to put on. The outfit that nearly all of the women here wear is a standard style, with different regions of the country adopting variations in pattern and color. The tops are called huipuils, and they are kind of bag-with-sleeves shaped giant heavy cotton shirts which are tucked in and bloused out over the skirt. They are pretty much always appliquéd or woven with some sort of brightly colored design, and are usually very pretty.
The skirt is basically a giant cloth tube which, when held out, could easily fit five people inside. It’s wrapped around your body several times, and covers from the waist to the ankles. It’s all held on to the body by simply tightly wrapping a woven or beaded belt around the waist several times, securing it by tucking in the belt edges.
They look, in a strange sort of way, like latino kimonos. They certainly require the wearer relatively small steps, and the give the body a very uniform shape, which only changes when it widens at the shoulders. I’ll try and post a picture once I get some good batteries for my camera. I’ve tried to buy some here, because I forgot to pack the ones I had at home, but they sell them already used and dead. It’s a pain.
Anyway, I felt like a silly, hot, bound-up fool in the outfit. As they were putting it on me, everyone around was delightfully chatting away in k’ichee’, and the only word I was consistently picking out sounded like “ooh-t.” I became convinced that “ooh-t” must mean something along the lines of “outlandish” or “absurd,” since that’s how I felt. Finally, I mustered up the courage to ask. Turns out, ladies and gents, that “Ut” means “Guapa,” which, for you non-Espanolites, is the feminine version of the word “handsome.”
I still wasn’t entirely convinced that I looked alright, but they were, so I just nodded and smiled and went along with it. It’s funny, because for the most part, I feel like no matter what I do I’m going to stand out here. I’m not going to normally wear Guatemalan outfits, and if I do, I’m so much taller than everyone else, and my hair is obviously a far cry from long and jet black. I’m noticeable no matter what. Although that should probably encourage me to take extra care of my appearance, instead, it’s kind of made me not care. I’m not going to conform, even if I want to, so I may as well be comfortable. Besides, I don’t have a mirror, so I don’t really ever know what I look like. Eh. Whatever.
Anyhow, we headed towards the town center (again) and I continued to receive compliments and stares. I even was whistled at a few times, which is the first time I’ve heard that happen at all since I’ve been here. Not only that, but once we finally got back to our seats at the festival, I even caught another upper-twenties aged teacher taking secret pictures of me. Turns out, I’m a babe in Guatemalan clothes. Sweet.
Of course, I almost blew my cover when I bent over in my seat to pick up a piece of paper which had fallen, and nearly toppled myself. I’d forgotten that I was bound up like a baby in bunting, and was expecting a bit more mobility. Luckily I caught myself in time; disaster averted.
After I got tired of sitting around at the presentation (as I write this it has been going on for 4 hours, with no signs of slowing, and so far it’s just been people standing on a stage and talking about how great teachers are) I headed back to the school, wanting to make it in time for lunch.
This is the second part of my day being ridiculous.
As always, I pushed my bowl through the little pass-through into the kitchen, the cooks took it, dished me up, and handed it back. I got my tortillas from the tortilla-distributor lady at the end of the line, and went to sit down. As I believe I’ve emphasized before, pretty much the only thing we eat here is rice, beans and tortillas. Today, however, we were in for a treat.
An orangy-red sauce sloshed around in the bottom of my shallow bowl, causing the few cooked potatoes and little slice of – meat? – to slide into one another. As I sat down, I timidly sniffed the dish, only to discover an odor reminiscent of barnyard bovine autopsies. Hm. That’s odd. The thin piece of meat was a rectangle a few inches long, with a smooth, connective tissue backing and a rough microvillus top. Although I inquired amongst my companions what this dish might be, they only giggled shyly and shrugged their shoulders. Odd.
I tried to eat a few of the potatoes, but couldn’t quite hack it. Everything had a sickening, rotten, dead smell to it. The girls around me were tearing into theirs with gusto, but anyone who’s heard me tell about Peruvian cuy knows I’ve learned my lesson with unknown, exotic foods.
I finished my tortillas in silence, wondering what vile ingredients this potion in front of me could possibly be concocted from. It didn’t take much deliberation for me to come to the obvious conclusion. I am, after all, a student of biology. This was clearly cow stomach soup. My suspicions were confirmed upon a more detailed quizzing of the girls. No one had wanted to tell me, for fear of my disgusted reaction, but Sherlock Jenna figured it out.
I passed my bowl down the table, letting someone else enjoy this culinary gem, and retired to my room to eat a sweet roll I’d purchased yesterday. Much safer, thank you very much.
Thursday, June 19, 2008
Ok, it's not that bad
Alright, after that rather dejected and depressing last post, it’s only fair that I focus on some of the positive things here. The problem is that when I’m really enjoying myself, or really feeling comfortable and settled in, it’s because I’m busy. I start to feel sad when I’ve got lots of downtime and no way to fill it – so I sit down and write about how frustrating this can be. Even though I’m totally exhausted right now, and would rather just go to bed, I think it’s important that I discuss the proverbial other side of the coin. I owe it to my loyal readership as much as I owe it to myself.
The girls here are absolutely fantastic. They love me, and anytime someone loves you in such a wholesome, giving, enthusiastic fashion, it’s impossible to resist reciprocating. They come by my room all evening long; from the moment I’m done with classes until I kick them out so I can go to bed. They just want to be around me, to ask me questions about my family, my friends, my life, my boyfriend, my interests, what’s different here from home…the questions are never ending. They adore teaching me Ki’chee’, with its impossibly difficult words, and invest an impressive amount of time into trying to coach distinctive clicks, clacks and clucks out of my throat. Not only that, but they’re so encouraging and animated in their endeavors that I’ve yet to get tired of making an effort. So far I’ve only retained a few words, but I’m making slow, sure progress. They assure me that I’m a quick learner, although I have to wonder how much of that is genuine truth and how much of it is encouraging teachers talking.
Meal times can be especially fun, since I frequently turn into the focal point for my entire table as they all contribute to my vocabulary. One of their particularly distinctive characteristics is a flamboyant sort of oral jewelry which seems to be in fashion. Most of the girls, and many adults, too, have several pieces of gold accent on their teeth. Sometimes it’s a whole golden tooth (I inquired; they’re actually just foil covers), other times it’s initials or designs. It’s quite a sight to have a whole table of girls sparkling their metallic joy at you.
Although I thought I was getting tired of the rather, er, consistent meal offerings, I must admit I’m becoming accustomed. Today, I didn’t go down for either lunch or breakfast, choosing instead to munch on some bread and fruit which I already had. By the time it was nearly the dinner hour, I must confess to having though “Mmm…a tortilla would really hit the spot right now.”
Granted, one of my favorite pastimes is preparing elaborate, new, or exotic meals. However, that’s really not always necessary, and there’s something nice about eating simply. Your body really just needs the nutrition, which you’ll surely get from rice and beans.
That kind of highlights one of the big, glaring points of being here. Out of necessity, they strip everything down to the bare essentials. Although that can be viewed as bare and gloomy, it can be alternately considered refreshing. I don’t really need everything extra; I’m just accustomed to luxury.
Perhaps part of the reason it’s easy to see things that way while I’m here is the religious atmosphere of the school. There are Catholic sisters who live just a few doors down from me, and every meal is begun and ended with both an Our Father and a prayer-song asking for the blessing of our food. Although I’ve never been a particularly pious individual, I’ve noticed that I find it quite nice. When people start and close a simple, three-ingredient meal with a prayer thanking God for his abundance, it’s impossible to ignore the fact that this is actually abundance. Here, at La Asuncion, we get three meals a day. At home, many of these girls would never have such plentiful food.
In addition to the dinnertime prayers, all group gatherings and activities include some thanking of God for generosity and blessings. Again, not considering myself to be particularly devout, this is somewhat new to me. Notwithstanding, I’ve found it to be comforting, and reassuring. I miss Ricky and my family and friends terribly. However, when you’re being constantly reminded to think of God’s hand in everything, it’s easier to accept being away from them. Love is love, right? Regardless of where you are, or where they are, or where He is. I can honestly say that I don’t think I would have thought this way had I gone elsewhere, where this influence would have been absent. It’s been, really and truly, a blessing.
I think that the completely nonchalant, unobtrusive nature of this spiritual focus has been helpful, too. Although religious influence is present, its existence is so casual that I don’t feel forced into conforming to strongly devotional attitudes. Instead, it’s just a part of the day, like washing your dishes after each meal (which, by the way, is done by dumping water out of a big trough over your plate, sloshing it around with your hand, and dumping more water. Good thing my lack of a dishwasher for the past two years has instilled me with a loose interpretation of “clean dishes.”).
Yeah, I still have moments where I wonder what the hell I’m doing here. Being whistled at by machisto seventh grade boys when I took off my sweater today (I was wearing a t-shirt. Come on!) is a good example. It’s exhausting trying to control my classes, but I’m hoping that things will improve once they see that I’m not going to take their b.s. Sorry, boys, but I don’t give up on things I’ve set my mind to. You’ll break first, I guarantee it. In the meantime, I’ll just keep getting worn out. That way, it’s easier for me to fall asleep early, which is important considering the stupid early morning wake-up calls!
The girls here are absolutely fantastic. They love me, and anytime someone loves you in such a wholesome, giving, enthusiastic fashion, it’s impossible to resist reciprocating. They come by my room all evening long; from the moment I’m done with classes until I kick them out so I can go to bed. They just want to be around me, to ask me questions about my family, my friends, my life, my boyfriend, my interests, what’s different here from home…the questions are never ending. They adore teaching me Ki’chee’, with its impossibly difficult words, and invest an impressive amount of time into trying to coach distinctive clicks, clacks and clucks out of my throat. Not only that, but they’re so encouraging and animated in their endeavors that I’ve yet to get tired of making an effort. So far I’ve only retained a few words, but I’m making slow, sure progress. They assure me that I’m a quick learner, although I have to wonder how much of that is genuine truth and how much of it is encouraging teachers talking.
Meal times can be especially fun, since I frequently turn into the focal point for my entire table as they all contribute to my vocabulary. One of their particularly distinctive characteristics is a flamboyant sort of oral jewelry which seems to be in fashion. Most of the girls, and many adults, too, have several pieces of gold accent on their teeth. Sometimes it’s a whole golden tooth (I inquired; they’re actually just foil covers), other times it’s initials or designs. It’s quite a sight to have a whole table of girls sparkling their metallic joy at you.
Although I thought I was getting tired of the rather, er, consistent meal offerings, I must admit I’m becoming accustomed. Today, I didn’t go down for either lunch or breakfast, choosing instead to munch on some bread and fruit which I already had. By the time it was nearly the dinner hour, I must confess to having though “Mmm…a tortilla would really hit the spot right now.”
Granted, one of my favorite pastimes is preparing elaborate, new, or exotic meals. However, that’s really not always necessary, and there’s something nice about eating simply. Your body really just needs the nutrition, which you’ll surely get from rice and beans.
That kind of highlights one of the big, glaring points of being here. Out of necessity, they strip everything down to the bare essentials. Although that can be viewed as bare and gloomy, it can be alternately considered refreshing. I don’t really need everything extra; I’m just accustomed to luxury.
Perhaps part of the reason it’s easy to see things that way while I’m here is the religious atmosphere of the school. There are Catholic sisters who live just a few doors down from me, and every meal is begun and ended with both an Our Father and a prayer-song asking for the blessing of our food. Although I’ve never been a particularly pious individual, I’ve noticed that I find it quite nice. When people start and close a simple, three-ingredient meal with a prayer thanking God for his abundance, it’s impossible to ignore the fact that this is actually abundance. Here, at La Asuncion, we get three meals a day. At home, many of these girls would never have such plentiful food.
In addition to the dinnertime prayers, all group gatherings and activities include some thanking of God for generosity and blessings. Again, not considering myself to be particularly devout, this is somewhat new to me. Notwithstanding, I’ve found it to be comforting, and reassuring. I miss Ricky and my family and friends terribly. However, when you’re being constantly reminded to think of God’s hand in everything, it’s easier to accept being away from them. Love is love, right? Regardless of where you are, or where they are, or where He is. I can honestly say that I don’t think I would have thought this way had I gone elsewhere, where this influence would have been absent. It’s been, really and truly, a blessing.
I think that the completely nonchalant, unobtrusive nature of this spiritual focus has been helpful, too. Although religious influence is present, its existence is so casual that I don’t feel forced into conforming to strongly devotional attitudes. Instead, it’s just a part of the day, like washing your dishes after each meal (which, by the way, is done by dumping water out of a big trough over your plate, sloshing it around with your hand, and dumping more water. Good thing my lack of a dishwasher for the past two years has instilled me with a loose interpretation of “clean dishes.”).
Yeah, I still have moments where I wonder what the hell I’m doing here. Being whistled at by machisto seventh grade boys when I took off my sweater today (I was wearing a t-shirt. Come on!) is a good example. It’s exhausting trying to control my classes, but I’m hoping that things will improve once they see that I’m not going to take their b.s. Sorry, boys, but I don’t give up on things I’ve set my mind to. You’ll break first, I guarantee it. In the meantime, I’ll just keep getting worn out. That way, it’s easier for me to fall asleep early, which is important considering the stupid early morning wake-up calls!
Wednesday, June 18, 2008
Rough Start....
17th June
I’m a few days into my new life as a live-in teacher now. All of the girls I live with are very nice and friendly – whenever my curtains or door are open, they come in to say hi and chit-chat. I’ve got lots of pictures of home and friends (both the Montana and Oregon versions), and they’re constantly asking me questions about them. Ironically, the truth is that it’s actually kind of made things a bit harder for me. They especially like to hear about my family and about Ricky, which means I’m constantly having to say “Yes, that’s my boyfriend. Yes, that’s my Dad…” which is followed by “Oh, they look so nice! Don’t you miss them? Are you sad to be here?” The truth is, yes, I miss them very much, and to be honest I’d rather be home than here thus far. However, I can’t very well say to their faces “Yes, I miss them terribly, and I don’t want to be here with you.” So instead I have to pretend that it doesn’t bother me at all, and that I’m really really excited to be here, but you can only say that so many ways without it starting to sound and feel a bit hollow.
It’s funny, because I clearly approached this whole moving to Guatemala thing as a great big adventure, a project which would be exhilarating and riotously fun. That was a bit ridiculous of me. Of course I knew better – didn’t I go through this whole same process when I went to Chile? I was homesick, but I didn’t want to admit it to myself or anyone else, because that felt like defeat. The truth of the matter is, it’s tough starting over anywhere – I even had a rough start in New York last summer, before I made any friends and before I felt settled in. It’s obviously going to take an adjustment period for everything to sink in, for me to get a regular routine going, for me to understand all of those unexplained MOs that every new place has. It doesn’t help any that teaching would be totally out of my comfort zone even if I was doing it at home. Long story short, this isn’t really easy, and I don’t think it will be anytime soon. The few days that I’ve been up here at the school have been full of periodical emotions. There are two wake-up bells which are long, loud and persistent, one at 6 and the other at 7. The 7am one is followed by breakfast, but after that I have nothing to do until lunch at noon. Following that, classes don’t start until 1:30. This means that I’ve got all sorts of free time, and I don’t know what to do with it. I can try and prepare classes, but since I don’t really have a clue how to do that, it doesn’t take long for me to get bored with that. The girls spend the morning lazing around in their rooms socializing, or doing their laundry or their homework, occasionally coming and visiting me. However, just like what happened to me in Chile, it’s pretty easy for all of this free time to dissolve into me trying to find ways to keep my mind off of being lonely and a bit depressed. I just don’t feel comfortable or at home yet, and I don’t know what to do with myself, and that’s not exactly a recipe for success.
Of course, this is only the first week. It’s probably no indication of what the whole duration of my time here will be like. Once I get a better idea of what I’m doing teaching, I’m sure it will be easier to occupy my time. It doesn’t help, of course, that my classes aren’t particularly interested in making this a good experience for me. Each of my seven classes has around 50 students in it, students who don’t have a very good idea of what it means to sit down and pay attention. They do a great job of jumping up and running around the room, falling out of their chairs, refusing to speak aloud when asked a question and refusing to be quiet when it’s someone else’s turn, and laughing at my every Spanish grammar slip-up. A good example is the matter of doing role-call. With all of my first classes I called of all of the names on the attendance list, despite the fact that they’re names like “Manuela Guarchaj Ecoquij”, “Angela Magdalena Ajtzalam Simaj,” “Diego Mardoqueo Marroquin Salquil” and “Isabela Rufina Tzoc Ixquiactap.” Multiply names like that by 50 and it’s needless to say that attendance alone took up a significant amount of the class period. Especially once you insert time for peals of laughter after my every attempt at pronouncing a name. Whew. Trial by fire, and although I survived, it was with third degree burns.
Then, come to find out later, every student has a number, and all you have to do is ask them to count off, and then role’s done. Thanks, kids, for telling me.
I think one of the major problems I’m facing is the fact that I’m the only English-speaker here right now. In the past, other English teachers have come down in pairs, or joined a teacher who had come down in a pair and then stayed for a significant period of time. In contrast, I’m replacing someone who had been here for a full school year, and had enjoyed the benefit of “student teaching” with another experienced teacher before she took over the role herself. It would certainly be nice to have somewhat of a guide to help me understand what is expected of me and the general way the show is run around here.
I don’t want to sound overly pessimistic, and I’m sure that if I’d sat down to right this an hour earlier or an hour later it would have had a different tone to it. That’s just the thing – I’m doing so much adjusting that it gets overwhelming. I’m alternately excited to be here and see how things shape up, and totally frustrated with myself for ever thinking this was a good idea. At the same time, I can tell myself with confidence that I’m a pretty strong person, and there are plenty of people in the world who go on long-term foreign missions and into the Peace Corps or – man, off to war, and if they can all make it through I will to. (Then it just becomes a question of why exactly I felt it necessary to test myself like this in the first place. I’m still working on the answer to that.)
Alright, that’s probably enough musing for now. As I’ve told Ricky in emails, more than anything else, it’s mostly therapeutic to me when I spill my beans (literally, since that’s all I’ve eaten since I got here – beans. Every meal. Sometimes it’s only beans and tortillas, sometimes they mix it up by adding some cold scrambled eggs, or maybe rice. But always beans.) I don’t mean for this to be worrisome to anyone that I’m falling into some irreparable depression, or that I’ve become totally disenchanted with my decision to come here, or anything along those lines. More than anything else, it just provides a reality check for myself – something along the lines of “Sorry, toots, but as much fun as it was to imagine that this would be a tropical escape vacation, you knew better from the beginning. Time to face the music.”
18th June
It looks like I’m going to head to town at some point this morning, and hopefully post some of these blog thoughts which I’ve been recording, so I decided I should even it out a bit. That last part was clearly when I was feeling pretty unhappy about being here; so far this morning I’ve yet to feel that way. Probably because I haven’t had any classes yet.
Last night we had a great time. Yesterday was Father’s Day in Guatemala, and they did a big evening presentation for all of the fathers who work at the school. It was a pretty hilarious program. It was basically a talent show with an open invitation to anyone to perform. This means that there were kids standing up and singing off-tune, refusing to sit down when they were applauded loudly by their classmates, a four-girl group of scantily-clad young teenagers shaking their bootys in front of the panel of father professors (the principal spent most of the song trying to get the attention of the guy with the stereo, to make him cut it short), and a half a dozen lip-syncing acts. Of course, every single act which required music had to insert a long pause in the show while they scanned through all of the songs on several CDs before finding the right one. Real quality entertainment.
It went on for literally hours, and by the time I got back to my room it was almost 10 o’clock. As things go around here, I didn’t come up alone, but with a little band of merry followers, who stayed until 11 despite my hinting that I had classes to prepare. I wouldn’t mind staying up late and working, but the 6 am bell virtually eliminates any hope of sleeping in. Well, and if you do make it back to sleep after that, there’s always the 7 am bell to get you on your feet and on with your day. I need to try and figure out some way to record the bells, they’re really something. It’s a series of incredibly loud long and short tones (tones? Maybe screeches is a better description) which lasts about 20 seconds. That’s a long time when it’s waking you up! It’s pretty unfortunate, really, because I used to have a tendency to be the worst possible version of Jenna that exists upon awaking in the morning. I pretty much just spent my first half an hour or so of every morning scowling around and hating the world for not letting me sleep. However, I’d honestly gotten over that this past year, and was able to wake up and have a civil conversation immediately. Tragically, with my daily rude jolt from slumberland, I can already feel my previous condition returning. Bummer.
Despite that little problem, mornings here are pretty relaxed (which is why I’m going to go to Santo Tomas today. I don’t have much else to do.)
There have been some fun things, too. The girls are really getting a kick out of teaching me Ki’che’ , the native Mayan language, which sounds like a mix between Arabic, German, and the African bush language full of clicks. Basically, there are lots of lilting, pretty sounding words like iliawakan (toes), which are started, finished, or interrupted by guttural clicks and gurgles. Some of the sounds are pretty close to impossible for me to make, but everyone just dissolves into giggles when I try to pronounce them, so at least it’s fun. They’re all very sweet and caring, and a couple have already attached themselves to me. They’re very affectionate, stopping by to say “Que sueñas con los angelitos” (Dream with the little angels) before bed, hugging me around the waste when we walk places, and constantly tugging on my hands. I seem to tower over all of them, probably as a product of the malnutrition which they experience here.
That’s all nice, but the real fun of the day starts with classes at 1:30. Actually, to be more accurate, I should probably call it “horror” instead of “fun.” It’s just really quite difficult to stand in front of fifty or more kids, get them to all shut up and pay attention, and then somehow find an interesting or fun way to present a new idea. So far I’ve been consistently failing. It’s funny, because before I came down here, any time I told people I was nervous about not knowing how to teach they’d say “Oh, it’ll be easy!” or “Oh, it’ll come to you as soon as you’re in front of a class!” Yeah, that’s a nice idea, guys, but people get four year degrees in education for a reason. You don’t say the same things about nursing or engineering do you? There’s definitely technique and skill required, two things which I’m painfully lacking right now. Of course, it’s not exactly my fault, since I never intended to be a teacher and never presented myself to the Diocese as if I had any idea how to do it, but regardless of whose fault it is, I’m now the one dealing with it.
One of the main problems I’m running into, besides discipline, is knowing what each class needs to learn. There are three sections of one level and two sections of the other two levels, and it should be safe to presume that at least each section of each level has a similar background in English. So far, that doesn’t appear to be true. This means that I’m teaching seven different classes. I’m going to try and bring things together a bit, but doing that is a complicated endeavor.
Notwithstanding these various frustrations, I’m somehow able to ignorantly walk into each class thinking that it will be better than last time. A lot of the improvement, sadly, has to come from me being quite strict, which I hate. I never wanted to be the mean teacher, but I don’t have any better way thus far to get their attention. When three boys won’t stop singing under their breaths, I can’t just let them keep doing it! They just get louder and louder, and I spent the whole fifty minutes of class yelling. And then I go do it again, for another class. All afternoon long. It’s exhausting! So, instead, I have to yell at them, or threaten them, and the next thing you know I’ll be the Wicked Witch of English.
All of that being said, I should spend some time preparing for today’s classes before I try and go into town.
I’m a few days into my new life as a live-in teacher now. All of the girls I live with are very nice and friendly – whenever my curtains or door are open, they come in to say hi and chit-chat. I’ve got lots of pictures of home and friends (both the Montana and Oregon versions), and they’re constantly asking me questions about them. Ironically, the truth is that it’s actually kind of made things a bit harder for me. They especially like to hear about my family and about Ricky, which means I’m constantly having to say “Yes, that’s my boyfriend. Yes, that’s my Dad…” which is followed by “Oh, they look so nice! Don’t you miss them? Are you sad to be here?” The truth is, yes, I miss them very much, and to be honest I’d rather be home than here thus far. However, I can’t very well say to their faces “Yes, I miss them terribly, and I don’t want to be here with you.” So instead I have to pretend that it doesn’t bother me at all, and that I’m really really excited to be here, but you can only say that so many ways without it starting to sound and feel a bit hollow.
It’s funny, because I clearly approached this whole moving to Guatemala thing as a great big adventure, a project which would be exhilarating and riotously fun. That was a bit ridiculous of me. Of course I knew better – didn’t I go through this whole same process when I went to Chile? I was homesick, but I didn’t want to admit it to myself or anyone else, because that felt like defeat. The truth of the matter is, it’s tough starting over anywhere – I even had a rough start in New York last summer, before I made any friends and before I felt settled in. It’s obviously going to take an adjustment period for everything to sink in, for me to get a regular routine going, for me to understand all of those unexplained MOs that every new place has. It doesn’t help any that teaching would be totally out of my comfort zone even if I was doing it at home. Long story short, this isn’t really easy, and I don’t think it will be anytime soon. The few days that I’ve been up here at the school have been full of periodical emotions. There are two wake-up bells which are long, loud and persistent, one at 6 and the other at 7. The 7am one is followed by breakfast, but after that I have nothing to do until lunch at noon. Following that, classes don’t start until 1:30. This means that I’ve got all sorts of free time, and I don’t know what to do with it. I can try and prepare classes, but since I don’t really have a clue how to do that, it doesn’t take long for me to get bored with that. The girls spend the morning lazing around in their rooms socializing, or doing their laundry or their homework, occasionally coming and visiting me. However, just like what happened to me in Chile, it’s pretty easy for all of this free time to dissolve into me trying to find ways to keep my mind off of being lonely and a bit depressed. I just don’t feel comfortable or at home yet, and I don’t know what to do with myself, and that’s not exactly a recipe for success.
Of course, this is only the first week. It’s probably no indication of what the whole duration of my time here will be like. Once I get a better idea of what I’m doing teaching, I’m sure it will be easier to occupy my time. It doesn’t help, of course, that my classes aren’t particularly interested in making this a good experience for me. Each of my seven classes has around 50 students in it, students who don’t have a very good idea of what it means to sit down and pay attention. They do a great job of jumping up and running around the room, falling out of their chairs, refusing to speak aloud when asked a question and refusing to be quiet when it’s someone else’s turn, and laughing at my every Spanish grammar slip-up. A good example is the matter of doing role-call. With all of my first classes I called of all of the names on the attendance list, despite the fact that they’re names like “Manuela Guarchaj Ecoquij”, “Angela Magdalena Ajtzalam Simaj,” “Diego Mardoqueo Marroquin Salquil” and “Isabela Rufina Tzoc Ixquiactap.” Multiply names like that by 50 and it’s needless to say that attendance alone took up a significant amount of the class period. Especially once you insert time for peals of laughter after my every attempt at pronouncing a name. Whew. Trial by fire, and although I survived, it was with third degree burns.
Then, come to find out later, every student has a number, and all you have to do is ask them to count off, and then role’s done. Thanks, kids, for telling me.
I think one of the major problems I’m facing is the fact that I’m the only English-speaker here right now. In the past, other English teachers have come down in pairs, or joined a teacher who had come down in a pair and then stayed for a significant period of time. In contrast, I’m replacing someone who had been here for a full school year, and had enjoyed the benefit of “student teaching” with another experienced teacher before she took over the role herself. It would certainly be nice to have somewhat of a guide to help me understand what is expected of me and the general way the show is run around here.
I don’t want to sound overly pessimistic, and I’m sure that if I’d sat down to right this an hour earlier or an hour later it would have had a different tone to it. That’s just the thing – I’m doing so much adjusting that it gets overwhelming. I’m alternately excited to be here and see how things shape up, and totally frustrated with myself for ever thinking this was a good idea. At the same time, I can tell myself with confidence that I’m a pretty strong person, and there are plenty of people in the world who go on long-term foreign missions and into the Peace Corps or – man, off to war, and if they can all make it through I will to. (Then it just becomes a question of why exactly I felt it necessary to test myself like this in the first place. I’m still working on the answer to that.)
Alright, that’s probably enough musing for now. As I’ve told Ricky in emails, more than anything else, it’s mostly therapeutic to me when I spill my beans (literally, since that’s all I’ve eaten since I got here – beans. Every meal. Sometimes it’s only beans and tortillas, sometimes they mix it up by adding some cold scrambled eggs, or maybe rice. But always beans.) I don’t mean for this to be worrisome to anyone that I’m falling into some irreparable depression, or that I’ve become totally disenchanted with my decision to come here, or anything along those lines. More than anything else, it just provides a reality check for myself – something along the lines of “Sorry, toots, but as much fun as it was to imagine that this would be a tropical escape vacation, you knew better from the beginning. Time to face the music.”
18th June
It looks like I’m going to head to town at some point this morning, and hopefully post some of these blog thoughts which I’ve been recording, so I decided I should even it out a bit. That last part was clearly when I was feeling pretty unhappy about being here; so far this morning I’ve yet to feel that way. Probably because I haven’t had any classes yet.
Last night we had a great time. Yesterday was Father’s Day in Guatemala, and they did a big evening presentation for all of the fathers who work at the school. It was a pretty hilarious program. It was basically a talent show with an open invitation to anyone to perform. This means that there were kids standing up and singing off-tune, refusing to sit down when they were applauded loudly by their classmates, a four-girl group of scantily-clad young teenagers shaking their bootys in front of the panel of father professors (the principal spent most of the song trying to get the attention of the guy with the stereo, to make him cut it short), and a half a dozen lip-syncing acts. Of course, every single act which required music had to insert a long pause in the show while they scanned through all of the songs on several CDs before finding the right one. Real quality entertainment.
It went on for literally hours, and by the time I got back to my room it was almost 10 o’clock. As things go around here, I didn’t come up alone, but with a little band of merry followers, who stayed until 11 despite my hinting that I had classes to prepare. I wouldn’t mind staying up late and working, but the 6 am bell virtually eliminates any hope of sleeping in. Well, and if you do make it back to sleep after that, there’s always the 7 am bell to get you on your feet and on with your day. I need to try and figure out some way to record the bells, they’re really something. It’s a series of incredibly loud long and short tones (tones? Maybe screeches is a better description) which lasts about 20 seconds. That’s a long time when it’s waking you up! It’s pretty unfortunate, really, because I used to have a tendency to be the worst possible version of Jenna that exists upon awaking in the morning. I pretty much just spent my first half an hour or so of every morning scowling around and hating the world for not letting me sleep. However, I’d honestly gotten over that this past year, and was able to wake up and have a civil conversation immediately. Tragically, with my daily rude jolt from slumberland, I can already feel my previous condition returning. Bummer.
Despite that little problem, mornings here are pretty relaxed (which is why I’m going to go to Santo Tomas today. I don’t have much else to do.)
There have been some fun things, too. The girls are really getting a kick out of teaching me Ki’che’ , the native Mayan language, which sounds like a mix between Arabic, German, and the African bush language full of clicks. Basically, there are lots of lilting, pretty sounding words like iliawakan (toes), which are started, finished, or interrupted by guttural clicks and gurgles. Some of the sounds are pretty close to impossible for me to make, but everyone just dissolves into giggles when I try to pronounce them, so at least it’s fun. They’re all very sweet and caring, and a couple have already attached themselves to me. They’re very affectionate, stopping by to say “Que sueñas con los angelitos” (Dream with the little angels) before bed, hugging me around the waste when we walk places, and constantly tugging on my hands. I seem to tower over all of them, probably as a product of the malnutrition which they experience here.
That’s all nice, but the real fun of the day starts with classes at 1:30. Actually, to be more accurate, I should probably call it “horror” instead of “fun.” It’s just really quite difficult to stand in front of fifty or more kids, get them to all shut up and pay attention, and then somehow find an interesting or fun way to present a new idea. So far I’ve been consistently failing. It’s funny, because before I came down here, any time I told people I was nervous about not knowing how to teach they’d say “Oh, it’ll be easy!” or “Oh, it’ll come to you as soon as you’re in front of a class!” Yeah, that’s a nice idea, guys, but people get four year degrees in education for a reason. You don’t say the same things about nursing or engineering do you? There’s definitely technique and skill required, two things which I’m painfully lacking right now. Of course, it’s not exactly my fault, since I never intended to be a teacher and never presented myself to the Diocese as if I had any idea how to do it, but regardless of whose fault it is, I’m now the one dealing with it.
One of the main problems I’m running into, besides discipline, is knowing what each class needs to learn. There are three sections of one level and two sections of the other two levels, and it should be safe to presume that at least each section of each level has a similar background in English. So far, that doesn’t appear to be true. This means that I’m teaching seven different classes. I’m going to try and bring things together a bit, but doing that is a complicated endeavor.
Notwithstanding these various frustrations, I’m somehow able to ignorantly walk into each class thinking that it will be better than last time. A lot of the improvement, sadly, has to come from me being quite strict, which I hate. I never wanted to be the mean teacher, but I don’t have any better way thus far to get their attention. When three boys won’t stop singing under their breaths, I can’t just let them keep doing it! They just get louder and louder, and I spent the whole fifty minutes of class yelling. And then I go do it again, for another class. All afternoon long. It’s exhausting! So, instead, I have to yell at them, or threaten them, and the next thing you know I’ll be the Wicked Witch of English.
All of that being said, I should spend some time preparing for today’s classes before I try and go into town.
Sunday, June 15, 2008
Back to School
Today, I move up to Asunción – the school in Xejuyup. We went and visited yesterday, and I’m glad that we did, because it got me much more excited about being there. I think I’m going to be incredibly busy; looking over the notes that Kristen, the last volunteer left, I can see that a lot of work goes into teaching these classes. My day won’t start until 1:30, so I’ll have the mornings to prepare things, but then after that class goes until 6 pm, followed by dinner, then a little evening activity with the girls who board at the school. Luckily, just in the hour or so that I was there poking around yesterday it was very evident that the students are excited to have me there. Every time we turned around a new little gaggle of girls had assembled behind us, waiting for a chance to introduce themselves. I think I’m going to have to insist on nametags or something.
My room is quite nice – it’s much larger than I expected, and has a private shower and toilet. The shower was especially appreciated once we took a little tour of the school, and I saw the girls’ “shower.” It’s a giant, tiled room with a huge tube somewhat like a cathedral baptismal fount in the middle. They all stand around together and dump buckets of cold water on themselves. Apparently it’s a “traditional” style bath house, and what the girls requested when it was built, but I’d rather have my Americanized alternative. (By the way, apparently when I was told that the shower was a waterfall, they were referring to the source of the water, not the actual location. The water is cold and fresh off the mountains, but it comes through a pipe into my room. Better.)
Once I get up to the school I will no longer have internet access, and I’ll probably only make it down to town about once a week. That means that these blog posts will probably be infrequent and long; get ready for it. I may try and make it into town with greater frequency, so I can communicate with people at home (and in Africa…) more often, but it takes a surprisingly long period of time to get between Xejuyup and Santo Tomas. Even though it’s only about 3 miles, it takes over 20 minutes on rough roads.
I was feeling pretty nervous about starting school, but I think it will be very nice to be surrounded by people and with plenty of work to do. I just need to have some purpose in my day, otherwise it’s pretty unfulfilling to sit around the mission and try to keep myself busy. I’d offer to help with stuff, but they already have way more staff than they can keep occupied, and I just get in the way since I don’t know how they want things done.
Anyhow, I’m going to head to the market and pick up some fruits and veggies to take with me to the school, then I’ll be moving up. I’m not exactly sure when the next post will be, so just keep checking!
Hasta entonces! (Until then)
Jenna
PS – my address here, in case anyone was wondering, is
Jenna Maria Emerson
Casa Parroquial
2a Calle 0-440
Zona 1
Santo Tomás la Unión
10017 Suchitepéquez
Guatemala, Central America
My room is quite nice – it’s much larger than I expected, and has a private shower and toilet. The shower was especially appreciated once we took a little tour of the school, and I saw the girls’ “shower.” It’s a giant, tiled room with a huge tube somewhat like a cathedral baptismal fount in the middle. They all stand around together and dump buckets of cold water on themselves. Apparently it’s a “traditional” style bath house, and what the girls requested when it was built, but I’d rather have my Americanized alternative. (By the way, apparently when I was told that the shower was a waterfall, they were referring to the source of the water, not the actual location. The water is cold and fresh off the mountains, but it comes through a pipe into my room. Better.)
Once I get up to the school I will no longer have internet access, and I’ll probably only make it down to town about once a week. That means that these blog posts will probably be infrequent and long; get ready for it. I may try and make it into town with greater frequency, so I can communicate with people at home (and in Africa…) more often, but it takes a surprisingly long period of time to get between Xejuyup and Santo Tomas. Even though it’s only about 3 miles, it takes over 20 minutes on rough roads.
I was feeling pretty nervous about starting school, but I think it will be very nice to be surrounded by people and with plenty of work to do. I just need to have some purpose in my day, otherwise it’s pretty unfulfilling to sit around the mission and try to keep myself busy. I’d offer to help with stuff, but they already have way more staff than they can keep occupied, and I just get in the way since I don’t know how they want things done.
Anyhow, I’m going to head to the market and pick up some fruits and veggies to take with me to the school, then I’ll be moving up. I’m not exactly sure when the next post will be, so just keep checking!
Hasta entonces! (Until then)
Jenna
PS – my address here, in case anyone was wondering, is
Jenna Maria Emerson
Casa Parroquial
2a Calle 0-440
Zona 1
Santo Tomás la Unión
10017 Suchitepéquez
Guatemala, Central America
Saturday, June 14, 2008
HIV/AIDS Conference
Well, this has been an interesting several days. Thursday afternoon, Shiela, myself and Martin, one of the clinic workers, headed off to Xela (pronounced shay-la) and then Quezaltenango, where we attended a two-day seminar/workshop/meeting of public health administrators regarding the epidemiology of HIV/AIDS in the country. The program consisted of a series of workshops, presentations, group discussions and tours of facilities in a handful of towns. Sheila had mentioned the trip to me on Wednesday, but she didn’t say anything spending the night until after we got in the Land Rover to leave. Oops. Anyhow, it was only a one night trip, so I ran into my room, haphazardly grabbed a few things, and then we took off.
The trip to Xela, which is one of the larger cities in the country, was about 2 hours long. Before coming down here, I had been of the impression that the majority of the roads here are a delightful mixture of dirt and mud. It turns out that the people I know who have been here and told me the road are absolutely terrible have never driven on Old Woods Road (or up Grizzly Gulch, for my Montana readers). Yeah, they’re rough, and terribly uncomfortable to ride on, especially for hours on end. But they’re all paved, even if it is poorly so. Long story short, we’ve seen worse in South Tillamook County. The only difference is that what the county roads department eventually repairs at home, after a year or ten, is the general state of affairs everywhere here.
We drove through some pretty impressive scenery on the way to Xela; densely vegetated mountains veiled by thick fog towered over deep values populated by little farming villages. I tried to take some photos as we drove along, but was relatively unsuccessful.
Um. I just saw a giant, unidentified insect scurry in through my open door and under my bed. I’m not squeamish about bugs, but this one looked particularly malicious. And deadly. I think I’ll be sitting here for a while.
Anyhow. We arrived in Xela and went to a local hospital which has a specific HIV/AIDS comprehensive treatment clinic. After a brief round of introductions (even though I generally feel pretty comfortable speaking Spanish one-on-one, I tend to get a bit nervous when I have to tell 30 people who I am and why I think I belong in a meeting of public health experts. It was a bit uncomfortable.) We toured their small facility, then went to a women’s health clinic nearby where we had a multitude of people present and discuss their prevention and treatment projects. It was all very interesting, especially with respect to the incredible sociocultural barriers which they’re dealing with. While some stigma regarding the disease still exists in the US, we’ve now got a historical context of over 20 years in dealing with it. Here, it’s just now becoming a more public issue, HIV+ people are still heavily discriminated against and no one wants to admit they have the disease. To address this, they are careful to have very discrete clinics with side entrances, etc, as well as being very sensitive to the fact that, when doing home visits of patients, it’s entirely likely that their family may not be aware.
Also, the culture is heavily machisto, and infidelity is a major problem. Men often have mistresses, and even if a wife knows that her husband is sleeping around she can’t insist that he use a condom. Additionally, even though prostitution is legal and widespread here, professional prostitutes have relatively low incidences of the disease. Instead, women who’s husbands have left to find work in other parts of the country, or in Mexico or the US, are often left abandoned. In order to feed their families, they are forced to have sex with neighbors. While it seems safer to them than actual prostitution, this false sense of security is causing the disease to spread. The population with the fastest growing rate of diagnosis is, in fact, housewives.
Additionally, the majority of people prefer to deliver their children in the home. This means that outreach programs to pregnant women and midwives regarding the huge risk of vaginal birth with an HIV+ mother are incredibly important.
It was heartening to see many faith-based organizations, specifically Catholic ones, collaborating with medical ministry programs. Many of them are very open about saying that they’ll certainly present people with the Catholic Church’s official position on family planning, but they’ll always emphasize education.
Crap. There’s that bug again. Apparently he flies. Onto my mattress. Eek.
Anyhow, it was very nice to see that nationwide Catholic institutions are very willing to educate people about how to best protect themselves, and leave the decision up to the individual. Carroll could take a lesson from that stance.
Another thing which was particularly shocking was the absolutely dismal economic situation many of these clinics are in. Sure, people working in public health in the US complain about funds, with good cause. But more incredible is the state of affairs here, where nurses spend their spare time making earrings and decorating pens to sell – in order to pay for antiretrovirals. Wow.
(I feel like a TV evangelist right now “If ya hear the Lord ca-ll-in’ ya name, a-ask-in’ ya ta GIVE, pick up tha phone raght now an’ give us ya credit card numba!!!”) But seriously, it’s bad.
After spending several hours hearing about various successful projects and regional statistics, we went to dinner, then drove another hour and a half to Quezaltanango, where we checked into a hotel and went to bed exhausted. Just driving around for a while on those roads really wipes you out!
The next morning we went to another set of similar meetings, then visited the “Proyecto Vida” house, which is an AIDS outreach center. They provide testing, counseling, medical care, home visitations and hospice care. They gave a very fascinating, incredibly moving presentation simply explaining what it is that they do. Although it wasn’t anything incredibly complicated, it was clearly very difficult work, and the people working there are passionate about what they do. Following that, we went to a hospice care home run by Catholic Relief Services and the Proyecto Vida center, where we toured the facility and had lunch with the patients. All in all, it was a great experience, and I feel quite fortunate to have been able to take part in all of this. Really, I was actually pretty out of place the whole time, since everyone else were clinic administators, project managers and government employees, but I was just tagging along behind Sheila. Luckily everyone was very nice, and no one dislikes a redhead with a foreign accent, so I was clearly very welcomed.
We came back in the late afternoon, in torrential rains, which were a bit refreshing after spending the day in scorching, sticky heat. The weather is entirely mercurial here (in both the Shakespearean sense and in the thermometer sense, actually). It’s pretty much always hot, but it changes rapidly from rain so hard you can’t see the road very far ahead to sun blazing through a haze of humidity. Thank God I’ve had 18 years of intensive immersion (get the joke?) training in living damply, so it doesn’t bother me much.
Well…I probably should try and write a lesson plan, or at least think about it, so maybe I’ll give that a shot right now. Hasta luego!
Postscript: I typed this last night, and am posting it in the morning. After eating breakfast, I was sitting in my room and saw the scary bug again. I got a picture, but I've got a really slow connection speed so I need to figure out another way to upload it. I do want to emphasize, though, that I was not overexaggerating. It's about an inch long, very very fast, and has literally dozens of long spiky legs jutting out from its torso. I'm pretty sure it could kill me just by thinking bad thoughts.
The trip to Xela, which is one of the larger cities in the country, was about 2 hours long. Before coming down here, I had been of the impression that the majority of the roads here are a delightful mixture of dirt and mud. It turns out that the people I know who have been here and told me the road are absolutely terrible have never driven on Old Woods Road (or up Grizzly Gulch, for my Montana readers). Yeah, they’re rough, and terribly uncomfortable to ride on, especially for hours on end. But they’re all paved, even if it is poorly so. Long story short, we’ve seen worse in South Tillamook County. The only difference is that what the county roads department eventually repairs at home, after a year or ten, is the general state of affairs everywhere here.
We drove through some pretty impressive scenery on the way to Xela; densely vegetated mountains veiled by thick fog towered over deep values populated by little farming villages. I tried to take some photos as we drove along, but was relatively unsuccessful.
Um. I just saw a giant, unidentified insect scurry in through my open door and under my bed. I’m not squeamish about bugs, but this one looked particularly malicious. And deadly. I think I’ll be sitting here for a while.
Anyhow. We arrived in Xela and went to a local hospital which has a specific HIV/AIDS comprehensive treatment clinic. After a brief round of introductions (even though I generally feel pretty comfortable speaking Spanish one-on-one, I tend to get a bit nervous when I have to tell 30 people who I am and why I think I belong in a meeting of public health experts. It was a bit uncomfortable.) We toured their small facility, then went to a women’s health clinic nearby where we had a multitude of people present and discuss their prevention and treatment projects. It was all very interesting, especially with respect to the incredible sociocultural barriers which they’re dealing with. While some stigma regarding the disease still exists in the US, we’ve now got a historical context of over 20 years in dealing with it. Here, it’s just now becoming a more public issue, HIV+ people are still heavily discriminated against and no one wants to admit they have the disease. To address this, they are careful to have very discrete clinics with side entrances, etc, as well as being very sensitive to the fact that, when doing home visits of patients, it’s entirely likely that their family may not be aware.
Also, the culture is heavily machisto, and infidelity is a major problem. Men often have mistresses, and even if a wife knows that her husband is sleeping around she can’t insist that he use a condom. Additionally, even though prostitution is legal and widespread here, professional prostitutes have relatively low incidences of the disease. Instead, women who’s husbands have left to find work in other parts of the country, or in Mexico or the US, are often left abandoned. In order to feed their families, they are forced to have sex with neighbors. While it seems safer to them than actual prostitution, this false sense of security is causing the disease to spread. The population with the fastest growing rate of diagnosis is, in fact, housewives.
Additionally, the majority of people prefer to deliver their children in the home. This means that outreach programs to pregnant women and midwives regarding the huge risk of vaginal birth with an HIV+ mother are incredibly important.
It was heartening to see many faith-based organizations, specifically Catholic ones, collaborating with medical ministry programs. Many of them are very open about saying that they’ll certainly present people with the Catholic Church’s official position on family planning, but they’ll always emphasize education.
Crap. There’s that bug again. Apparently he flies. Onto my mattress. Eek.
Anyhow, it was very nice to see that nationwide Catholic institutions are very willing to educate people about how to best protect themselves, and leave the decision up to the individual. Carroll could take a lesson from that stance.
Another thing which was particularly shocking was the absolutely dismal economic situation many of these clinics are in. Sure, people working in public health in the US complain about funds, with good cause. But more incredible is the state of affairs here, where nurses spend their spare time making earrings and decorating pens to sell – in order to pay for antiretrovirals. Wow.
(I feel like a TV evangelist right now “If ya hear the Lord ca-ll-in’ ya name, a-ask-in’ ya ta GIVE, pick up tha phone raght now an’ give us ya credit card numba!!!”) But seriously, it’s bad.
After spending several hours hearing about various successful projects and regional statistics, we went to dinner, then drove another hour and a half to Quezaltanango, where we checked into a hotel and went to bed exhausted. Just driving around for a while on those roads really wipes you out!
The next morning we went to another set of similar meetings, then visited the “Proyecto Vida” house, which is an AIDS outreach center. They provide testing, counseling, medical care, home visitations and hospice care. They gave a very fascinating, incredibly moving presentation simply explaining what it is that they do. Although it wasn’t anything incredibly complicated, it was clearly very difficult work, and the people working there are passionate about what they do. Following that, we went to a hospice care home run by Catholic Relief Services and the Proyecto Vida center, where we toured the facility and had lunch with the patients. All in all, it was a great experience, and I feel quite fortunate to have been able to take part in all of this. Really, I was actually pretty out of place the whole time, since everyone else were clinic administators, project managers and government employees, but I was just tagging along behind Sheila. Luckily everyone was very nice, and no one dislikes a redhead with a foreign accent, so I was clearly very welcomed.
We came back in the late afternoon, in torrential rains, which were a bit refreshing after spending the day in scorching, sticky heat. The weather is entirely mercurial here (in both the Shakespearean sense and in the thermometer sense, actually). It’s pretty much always hot, but it changes rapidly from rain so hard you can’t see the road very far ahead to sun blazing through a haze of humidity. Thank God I’ve had 18 years of intensive immersion (get the joke?) training in living damply, so it doesn’t bother me much.
Well…I probably should try and write a lesson plan, or at least think about it, so maybe I’ll give that a shot right now. Hasta luego!
Postscript: I typed this last night, and am posting it in the morning. After eating breakfast, I was sitting in my room and saw the scary bug again. I got a picture, but I've got a really slow connection speed so I need to figure out another way to upload it. I do want to emphasize, though, that I was not overexaggerating. It's about an inch long, very very fast, and has literally dozens of long spiky legs jutting out from its torso. I'm pretty sure it could kill me just by thinking bad thoughts.
Wednesday, June 11, 2008
Jour 2: Arriving at the Mission
Well, I got into Guatemala City around 10 pm last night, where I quickly went straight through customs (actually, to be more accurate, there was no customs process) and stepped outside to meet Sheila, one of the mission directors. We went directly from the airport to a little hostel/B&B place just a few blocks away, and stayed up talking for a little while. As excited and nervous as I was, I didn’t really get any sleep at all, which was especially bad since we had to be up and ready to go at 5:30 this morning. It takes 2 ½ to 3 hours to get to the mission, and today visitors from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation were coming to tour the site and learn about the projects.
The trip from the city to the mission, despite its actual length, went by very quickly. Never having been to central America, the scenery was all very new to me. Looking out the window from my bouncy jeep jump-seat, I felt as if I had stepped into an impeccably maintained prehistoric landscape. Massive, broadleaf swamp plants, fields of sugarcane, towering palms and swaying banana plants crowded up next to the road, along with huge-leafed trees draped in twisting vines and roughly-constructed huts selling the most violent looking of all fruits – fresh pineapple. In the distance, dozens of flawlessly conical volcanoes dotted the countryside, every fourth or fifth one issuing pretty little clouds of steam puffs which slowly drifted across the sky. All in all, it was reminiscent of the dinosaur dioramas found at the Museum of the Rockies, or the posters which filled my office at last summer’s paleontology job.
We arrived at the mission around 9, ate a quick breakfast of beans, freshly cooked tortillas and scrambled eggs (all heartily doused with homemade jalapeno sauce) and went out to meet the arriving philanthropic contingent. It turns out the people arriving were actually kind of big-shots – the director of the Gates Global Health Initiative and his administrative assistant. They explained that although historically the Gates Foundation has focused on Southeast Asia and India, it’s becoming increasingly evident that Latin America needs attention. We spent the morning touring the clinic, with various people presenting sundry projects (maternal health and mortality, medicinal herbs, clean home cooking stoves, etc). Once they left, I finally had my first opportunity to shower since about 6 am Tuesday, which was divine despite being cold.
We had a great lunch which was right up my ally – four different ways of preparing vegetables. Green beans, carrots, onions, mysteriously tangy potato pancakes, spinach, more corn tortillas, red peppers…delicious!
I’ve got a bit of down time now, during which I think I’ll look over a Natural Family Planning class that Sheila is interested in having me teach to young couples if I want to; mostly just as a method to teach sex education. Sheila, by the way, is very cool. She’s quite personable, and kind, and has awesome stories to tell about how the CIA confiscated her passport after she fled Guatemala to Mexico City in the 80's. She left Guatemala in order to avoid being "disappeared" as punishment for providing medical care to citizens attacked by the vicious military dictatorship. Once she finally made it back to the US (with help from the Swedish government, of all things) she continued to be followed across the country – California, New York, DC, even Montana. Whoa.
Later this afternoon, we’re going to go to Mazatenango, a nearby city, where one of the girls from the school is in the hospital. Apparently she fell earlier today, and got a pretty gigantic hematoma on her inner thigh, which needs to be operated on. We’ll visit her, and do some grocery shopping, and be back tonight for Mass with Father Hazelton. I still haven’t seen him, by the way, apparently he’s out of town until later today.
I don’t really know how often I’ll be able to use the internet; it’ll take a while before I settle into a routine, but I do know I’ll start teaching on Monday. I’ll let you all know how it goes!
The trip from the city to the mission, despite its actual length, went by very quickly. Never having been to central America, the scenery was all very new to me. Looking out the window from my bouncy jeep jump-seat, I felt as if I had stepped into an impeccably maintained prehistoric landscape. Massive, broadleaf swamp plants, fields of sugarcane, towering palms and swaying banana plants crowded up next to the road, along with huge-leafed trees draped in twisting vines and roughly-constructed huts selling the most violent looking of all fruits – fresh pineapple. In the distance, dozens of flawlessly conical volcanoes dotted the countryside, every fourth or fifth one issuing pretty little clouds of steam puffs which slowly drifted across the sky. All in all, it was reminiscent of the dinosaur dioramas found at the Museum of the Rockies, or the posters which filled my office at last summer’s paleontology job.
We arrived at the mission around 9, ate a quick breakfast of beans, freshly cooked tortillas and scrambled eggs (all heartily doused with homemade jalapeno sauce) and went out to meet the arriving philanthropic contingent. It turns out the people arriving were actually kind of big-shots – the director of the Gates Global Health Initiative and his administrative assistant. They explained that although historically the Gates Foundation has focused on Southeast Asia and India, it’s becoming increasingly evident that Latin America needs attention. We spent the morning touring the clinic, with various people presenting sundry projects (maternal health and mortality, medicinal herbs, clean home cooking stoves, etc). Once they left, I finally had my first opportunity to shower since about 6 am Tuesday, which was divine despite being cold.
We had a great lunch which was right up my ally – four different ways of preparing vegetables. Green beans, carrots, onions, mysteriously tangy potato pancakes, spinach, more corn tortillas, red peppers…delicious!
I’ve got a bit of down time now, during which I think I’ll look over a Natural Family Planning class that Sheila is interested in having me teach to young couples if I want to; mostly just as a method to teach sex education. Sheila, by the way, is very cool. She’s quite personable, and kind, and has awesome stories to tell about how the CIA confiscated her passport after she fled Guatemala to Mexico City in the 80's. She left Guatemala in order to avoid being "disappeared" as punishment for providing medical care to citizens attacked by the vicious military dictatorship. Once she finally made it back to the US (with help from the Swedish government, of all things) she continued to be followed across the country – California, New York, DC, even Montana. Whoa.
Later this afternoon, we’re going to go to Mazatenango, a nearby city, where one of the girls from the school is in the hospital. Apparently she fell earlier today, and got a pretty gigantic hematoma on her inner thigh, which needs to be operated on. We’ll visit her, and do some grocery shopping, and be back tonight for Mass with Father Hazelton. I still haven’t seen him, by the way, apparently he’s out of town until later today.
I don’t really know how often I’ll be able to use the internet; it’ll take a while before I settle into a routine, but I do know I’ll start teaching on Monday. I’ll let you all know how it goes!
Off to a good start!
Well, the trip is undeniably off to a good start. After enjoying a final wonderful (albeit wet) coastal weekend replete with weddings, birthday parties, and terribly-overdue reunions with long-time friends, I finished packing my things and bidding adieus. I got my first indication of a good omen at Martin Hemens’ 60th birthday celebration, when I responded to his inquiries about post-colligate plans with “Oh, I’m moving to Guatemala. Uh, Tuesday.” His enthusiastic response to the date, complete with a short run-down of how his journey from Europe to America started on a Tuesday, ended with an animated exclamation reassuring me that everything would work out legendarily; Tuesdays, after all, are the best days for starting an adventure.
Sure enough, his predictions have thus far held true. Despite the inordinate number of inter- and intra- continental plane trips I’ve taken in just the past few years, never before have I been privilege to the first-class experience. I have no idea how or why, but today I seem to have hit the jackpot. My seat on the flight from Houston to Guatemala City, where I now sit writing this passage, is 1F. That’s right – window seat, front row of the aircraft. Oh, excuse me; I must interrupt my typing to accept a fresh glass of Argentine Shiraz from the flight attendant. Don’t think I’m kidding.
Anyhow, where was I? Ah, yes, I was about to describe the First Class lifestyle thus far (something which I could easily, by the way, get used to. If those darn flight attendants would stop interrupting me, that is – I just was stopped at my work again in order to be offered some blueberry (with a peach confit topping) cheesecake. Seriously people, how am I supposed to get anything done while bathing in this luxury?)
Although airplane food has long been the fodder for unjust criticism, I’ll set the record straight by describing the evening’s meal. It began, of course, with a fresh, warm cloth towelette presented with silver tongs. After carefully cleaning my hands (uh, thanks guy sitting next to me, for helping me to understand that this was, in fact, the proper thing to do), I was offered the menu complete with four entrée options. “Ah, yes, the salmon with rice sounds lovely, thank you.”
Presented on a tray with a pretty pink tablecloth, we began with a lovely salad of tender garden greens complimented by sundried tomatoes, fresh mozzarella balls, traditional Cesar dressing and a cute ceramic bowl full of cashews. Following the presentation of a six-piece flatware set (silver, of course, with three forks, two knifes and an oddly shaped spoon, chilled and wrapped in a cloth napkin), we were offered warm (fresh baked?) (ok, maybe I’m being a bit overly romantic) dinner rolls. Once I’d neatly polished off the first course, the main attraction arrived. A piping hot plate, nearly overflowing with salmon steak, sautéed prawns, carrots and zucchini spears, and a cute little pile of rice and beans replaced my empty salad plate. It took me a minute to realize that the pretty yellow mesh package, smartly tied with a lime-green bow, was actually half a lemon ready for squeezing over my pink Atlantic catch. (Yeah. Atlantic. Lame, I know. But we can only ask for so much.)
And here I sit. Stuffed full, stretching my legs out in front of me and snuggling into my cushy, overstuffed leather seat. I think I’ll recline my seat back, enjoying the extended range of motion, and await my next glass of tasty red. How could I possible be nervous about this upcoming year of Guatemalan life, if this is what it’s all going to be about?
Disclaimer: Don’t worry. I know where I’m going – to the land of washboards for clothes cleaning and waterfalls for bathing. But I may as well enjoy this last taste of overly-prissy, suffocatingly extravagant lifestyle while I’ve got one last shot!
Sure enough, his predictions have thus far held true. Despite the inordinate number of inter- and intra- continental plane trips I’ve taken in just the past few years, never before have I been privilege to the first-class experience. I have no idea how or why, but today I seem to have hit the jackpot. My seat on the flight from Houston to Guatemala City, where I now sit writing this passage, is 1F. That’s right – window seat, front row of the aircraft. Oh, excuse me; I must interrupt my typing to accept a fresh glass of Argentine Shiraz from the flight attendant. Don’t think I’m kidding.
Anyhow, where was I? Ah, yes, I was about to describe the First Class lifestyle thus far (something which I could easily, by the way, get used to. If those darn flight attendants would stop interrupting me, that is – I just was stopped at my work again in order to be offered some blueberry (with a peach confit topping) cheesecake. Seriously people, how am I supposed to get anything done while bathing in this luxury?)
Although airplane food has long been the fodder for unjust criticism, I’ll set the record straight by describing the evening’s meal. It began, of course, with a fresh, warm cloth towelette presented with silver tongs. After carefully cleaning my hands (uh, thanks guy sitting next to me, for helping me to understand that this was, in fact, the proper thing to do), I was offered the menu complete with four entrée options. “Ah, yes, the salmon with rice sounds lovely, thank you.”
Presented on a tray with a pretty pink tablecloth, we began with a lovely salad of tender garden greens complimented by sundried tomatoes, fresh mozzarella balls, traditional Cesar dressing and a cute ceramic bowl full of cashews. Following the presentation of a six-piece flatware set (silver, of course, with three forks, two knifes and an oddly shaped spoon, chilled and wrapped in a cloth napkin), we were offered warm (fresh baked?) (ok, maybe I’m being a bit overly romantic) dinner rolls. Once I’d neatly polished off the first course, the main attraction arrived. A piping hot plate, nearly overflowing with salmon steak, sautéed prawns, carrots and zucchini spears, and a cute little pile of rice and beans replaced my empty salad plate. It took me a minute to realize that the pretty yellow mesh package, smartly tied with a lime-green bow, was actually half a lemon ready for squeezing over my pink Atlantic catch. (Yeah. Atlantic. Lame, I know. But we can only ask for so much.)
And here I sit. Stuffed full, stretching my legs out in front of me and snuggling into my cushy, overstuffed leather seat. I think I’ll recline my seat back, enjoying the extended range of motion, and await my next glass of tasty red. How could I possible be nervous about this upcoming year of Guatemalan life, if this is what it’s all going to be about?
Disclaimer: Don’t worry. I know where I’m going – to the land of washboards for clothes cleaning and waterfalls for bathing. But I may as well enjoy this last taste of overly-prissy, suffocatingly extravagant lifestyle while I’ve got one last shot!
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