A day in the life of Nate

The Regional Education office, where my office is located.

In the 2 years we spent contemplating joining Peace Corps, we spent a lot of time wondering what our daily life would be like. What will our house look like; how will we get water; would a solar charger be a good investment; what foods will be available; what will our worksites look like; how will we get to work… and the list goes on. As the weeks tick by, Ilana and I have slowly begun to settle into a groove and our routines have begun to emerge. The following is a description of a typical week for me.

This is what the Internet actually looks like.

On the weekdays I get up around 6am, without an alarm, right around the time the hospital’s generator turns off. It’s one of those sounds that’s far enough away that after a few minutes of hearing it your brain tunes it out until the second the sound goes away and you suddenly notice its absence. The din of the generator is quickly replaced by the calls of songbirds, roosters, dogs, cows, passing cars, sometimes a neighbour straight rocking some 90s soft rock, and the fluttering of the birds that come inside our house to pick off the moths that didn’t hide so well. I get up, make coffee (recently it’s been Starbucks French Roast sent by my parents… they should call it “Ground Black Awesomeness”), and put the dishes away from dinner the night before while the coffee steeps. By about 6:30am Ilana’s up and we sweep the floor to clear out all the dead insects the birds didn’t want. We work out… usually some yoga (thanks to the book Ilana’s mom sent us), I do a prison-type workout and Ilana might do a workout video or go for a run, which really turns some heads since running in public is not something sane people do here. Unfortunately, some mornings I have to burn our trash. Definitely not my favourite thing to do, but the trash is not going to burn itself.

At 8am I walk to work, which only takes 2 minutes since we live on the administrative compound. I like that much better than the 45 min drive through traffic back home. The last traffic jam I saw was when the Prime Minister’s motorcade stopped in front of the secondary school and a few minibuses waiting behind him.

Here I am in my office.

Although it seems silly to mention it, one thing I didn’t expect would be an important factor about working in Guyana is the dress code. I thought that since I’ll be living 7° from the equator I won’t be expected to wear pants or long-sleeve shirts… Wrong. As a rule, Guyanese (and I’m told most other cultures) tend to dress much more formally than Americans do for work. One policy in my office is that people wearing shorts are not even allowed inside the building. Guyanese are also fastidious about pressing (ironing) their clothes everyday. Now it finally makes sense why Peace Corps was so emphatic before we got here about volunteers dressing in business casual all the time… apparently it’s a consistent problem that PC admin has to deal with. I guess when most Americans think “Peace Corps chic” it doesn’t usually translate into business casual.

At this point in my service, my job is basically to be gathering information about my community, try to identify and prioritize the needs, and then try to come up with a plan to help people meet those needs. Most days I spend a good deal of time observing or researching things like teaching strategies or grants. I have also done a bunch of workshops with teachers on subjects like lesson planning, differentiated instruction, Marzano’s high yield strategies, components of literacy, how to teach reading when you’re not a reading teacher (thanks SBAC Mentor Coach peeps!), and student engagement. I’ve also been giving tutoring sessions a few nights each week. Monday night is math for secondary students, Tuesday is English for adults trying to pass their CXC test to get a better job, and Wednesday is science/engineering activity day where I have kids compete in groups on some challenge like “who can build the highest tower out of 7 pieces of paper and 1 piece of tape.” It’s going well so far but I’m worried I might get spread too thin.

So I work from 8am to 4:30pm with an hour lunch break between 12-1pm. Since Ilana and I both work so close to home we’re able to meet up every day for lunch, which has become a favourite little tradition of ours. Lunch is usually a sandwich, chips and fruit, even though Guyanese don’t consider a cold sandwich a meal. I guess it all balances out when we see them in their business suits eating chicken and rice with their hands.

At work the culture is very different. Here it’s much more formal, for example everyone is referred to by either Mr or Mrs and their surname. Depending on the time of day, everyone is greeted with the appropriate salutation, which here include “Morning, morning” or “G’afternoon”. Only after the Sun goes down will people greet each other with “Good night.” That took some getting used to… it’s common for people to answer the phone “Hello, good night.” They are also meticulous about qualities we Americans don’t emphasize as much like handwriting, spelling, drawing lines perfectly straight (like when they hand draw weekly schedules or budget forms)… all things I’m trying to improve on.

Ilana doing wash.

At 4:30pm everything closes and people make their way home. The road usually stays “busy” (all 4 minibuses driving back and forth) until about dusk and then it’s pretty dead. We usually do laundry every other day to stay on top of it since washing everything by hand takes a while. We start making dinner around 5:30pm or so. A typical week’s menu includes some combination of: pumpkin curry, mac’n cheese and steamed veggies, chow mein veggie stir fry, pizza from scratch, Ilana’s newly famous pumpkin chilli, dahl and roti (spiced split pea soup and flat bread), or mofongo. Sometimes we splurge and buy chicken to batter and fry… ok, my mouth is watering so I’ll stop there. We eat pretty well and Ilana has become quite an exceptional cook, especially considering that we only can buy produce once a week and, even then, have a limited selection.

Taking a swim after our one hour hike to the Kissing Rocks.

After dinner we’ll usually chill in our hammocks or under our mosquito net and just talk or read or watch a DVD we bought for a $1. Right now we’re ploughing through the entire series of Lost, which is the best show we never watched back home. We were watching Dexter but haven’ been able to find the second season (cough, cough….Alex… elbow nudge, elbow nudge).

Me sitting on top of the Kissing Rocks.

 

 

Weekends are really chill and usually include some combination of cleaning the house, doing laundry, gardening, going on a hike, visiting other volunteers, or entertaining visitors. We also like to experiment with new recipes. Saturday mornings we like to make breakfast and some kind of beverage. Recently we’ve been able to make tea from lemongrass in our garden, hot cocoa from a cocoa farm up the river, and my favourite… Bloody Mary’s with V8, pepper sauce, and good ol’fashioned Vodka smuggled from Venezuela. And despite not having an oven, I’ve successfully made corn bread, banana bread, soft pretzels, granola, and I think this weekend I’m going to attempt biscuits or pancakes and syrup or… call me crazy…. Both! I don’t know… I don’t know if there’ll be enough time (wink wink).

The view from the top.

 

Turtle, Turtle!

Since we have been in South America, Nate and I have been able to cross a few things off of our bucket list. This past week, Nate was able to cross a big one of his list; see an endangered Leatherback Turtle come to shore to nest. We spent one night at Shell Beach located about 45 minutes northeast by boat from Mabaruma and saw not one, not two, not three, not four….but FIVE Leatherback turtles up close and personal. So close, in fact, we could smell turtle breath. We set out Wednesday morning to visit the remote area of Shell Beach to work at the health post and primary school. Here we met Mr. Audley, who was the founder of Shell Beach about 27 years ago. Fun fact about Mr. Audley, he single-handily planted all the rows of palm trees that you can see today. There must be over 1,000 trees!

Downtown Shell Beach

Mr. Audley welcomed us to his community and showed us around, and by showed us around, I mean he pointed at the seven buildings in the area due to the minute size of this community. There are only about 120 inhabitants year-round with the exception of turtle nesting season when groups of gringos visit the area.

Shell Beach, Region 1, Guyana

We spent most of the morning working at the school and health post, giving vaccinations and assessing the needs of the two sectors. Around 4pm Nate and I headed out on a premature beach walk, (you will see why this was premature a bit later) to see if we could catch a glimpse of any other wildlife. Unfortunately, we didn’t see anything on our walk, but we were able to forage for some dinner. Remember how I said that Shell beach was really remote, well Shell Beach is so remote that there are absolutely no shops to buy food or even dry goods. The people who live there either grow their own food or come out to our village’s market once a month. Also, because of so much beach erosion this community’s once produce garden has since washed away. So all we had was a small jar of peanut butter and jelly and some crackers.















Luckily, Nate’s caveman instinct kicked in and he was able to score us four paw paw’s (this is what they call papaya), one coconut and some cassava leaves, which surprisingly taste a lot like bland spinach. Once we washed down our delectable meal with a bottle of lukewarm filtered water, it was almost time to set out on our 5-hour beach walk to spot our leathery-backed enormous friends.

At 8pm we set out on our night through what can only be described as the backdrop of “Where the Wild Things Are,” as one of the other volunteers so accurately described it. You are surrounded on one side by ocean and on the other side by straight-up jungle. The only light you can see is that of your flashlight and of the moon shining on the pitch-black ocean. There was absolutely nobody else on the beach but our team of 8 and our turtle expert. By hour three we saw our first turtle in all her glory! This turtle was about 6 feet long and an impressive sight.

Leatherback turtles usually nest multiple times during the season at which time they can lay up to 120 eggs at one time. Once on shore they dig a deep hole using there two back fins; it almost looks like ice cream being scooped out with a scooper. After they lay their eggs they cover them up by flinging sand in every direction to camouflage where the eggs have been laid. Once this laborious process is done, which takes about an hour or so, our huge turtle friends make there way back to the water and disappears into the waves. Of all the eggs that leatherback turtles lay, only about 5% will actually survive and sometimes even less than that. In Guyana, turtle eggs are a delicacy and are commonly poached.

Some eggs had to be relocated further up the beach to give the hatchlings a better chance at survival.

I hate to admit this, but since I have been here I have eaten a turtle egg. I am not proud of this, but it was a cultural experience I couldn’t pass up and with all honestly I would have been considered rude otherwise. It was gross! The eggs are slightly boiled and due to the consistency of the outer shell you have to bite a small hole and suck the yolk into your mouth. I ate half the egg when my gag reflexes starting kicking in, at which time I tossed the remainder of the egg over my shoulder and pretended to be fully satisfied with my turtle egg. Moral of the story, don’t eat the eggs of an endangered species!

A mommy flinging sand to camouflage her nest.

At around 1:30am we saw our last turtle and retreated to our hammocks for the night. Oh, I forgot to mention that the mosquitoes on Shell Beach were something out of an Alfred Hitchcock movie. During the day they aren’t bad, but as soon as five o’clock hits, its like someone releases them out a cage. They were so bad that we had to wear socks, long pants and sleeves and bathe ourselves in repellent. Even with all our efforts, I was unfortunately attacked by a swarm of mosquitoes in the time it took for me to change from a long sleeve shirt into a tank top and get into my hammock. All it took was 60 seconds of exposed skin! Nate left without a mark, but I guess I just have sweeter skin.

My back after getting swarmed.

These shelters are build by fishermen who stay in them for a few nights at a time when they're out fishing on the river. In the background you can see a flock of endangered Scarlet Ibis.

Till next time.

Spare time + change =

Since joining the Peace Corps and moving to Guyana, it would be fair, and in no way negative, to say that we now have some extra time on our hands. We’re doing our best to stay busy (i.e. gardening, reading, hammocking) and I’m definitely not complaining since having extra time seems to be one of the perks to our new life. So, below are the results of extra time + change.

Figure 1 - Lifestyle Changes

As you can see from figure 1, Ilana and I have experienced differing levels of enjoyment for some of these new changes.

Figure 2 - Water vs Stress

When we first moved to Mabaruma the learning curve was steep. Thankfully now things are leveling off as we get better settled in and finding a routine. We’ve begun to notice patterns in our attitudes. Figure 2 represents the inversely proportional relationship between the level of water in our tanks and our general level of stress.

Figure 3 - Cow Sounds

Another trend we’ve noticed is how our affinity for cows has changed. At first it was hilarious to hear a young calf and his mother taking turns trying to locate each other outside our window. However hearing that sound at 5:30am for 4 weeks in a row just makes me miss steak that much more.

Figure 4 - Our Guyanese food pyramid

Speaking of steak, some of the greatest changes so far have been in our diet. Perhaps one of the biggest surprises we’ve encountered so far (aside from Ilana’s appendix trying to explode) has been how much we miss food and drinks from home. Looking at pictures of ourselves from when we were State-side, it’s easy to believe we liked our food.

Figure 5 - Fantasies

Consequently we have some new fantasies.

Figure 6 - Reasons Nate Sweats

When I’m not dreaming about food, I’m probably sweating…. Though the two activities don’t seem to be mutually exclusive. Ilana’s dad, Jose, often says “you gotta sweat the body”. He’d be proud of me. Notice there is not a graph to represent Ilana’s perspiration pattern. I’m still trying to figure out her secret.


On a completely unrelated note… A few days ago I was riding in a truck and saw the largest bird I’ve ever seen sitting on the top of a really tall tree. Since we were driving away all I could see was it had the shape of a large eagle and was slate gray across the front of its breast. Hearing stories from SPICE fellows about the elusive Harpey Eagle, the largest bird of prey in the Western hemisphere, and knowing this area is included in their distribution, I have been trying to catch a glimpse of one since we’ve been here. I heard the screeching of some kind of eagle the other morning and when I looked outside to see what kind of raptor I saw a huge slate gray bird perched up in the top of a rubber tree. To the complete surprise and confusion of our neighbor, I ran outside to take these pics.... can anyone tell me if it's a juvenile Harpey. I know it's probably not, but maybe!

A 7 Hour Tour

Last Sunday, Nate and I set out on our very first river trip with a group of Guyanese educators and health personnel for the purpose of working with special needs children in two villages located in the Moruca sub-region. As you can already imagine, “business trips” take on a whole different meaning here in Region 1. Packing is a bit different. You have to pack sheets, a mosquito net, toilet paper, all of your food goods and of course your clothes and toiletries. This was challenging as we were gone for 5 days and were traveling in an 11-seater v-hull passenger boat made of wood with no cover that needed to fit 12 people and everyone’s luggage and about 40 gallons of fuel. Needless to say, a 4-hour trip turned into a 7-hour tour, coupled with a one-hour truck ride, where once again, a 5-passenger truck was crammed with 12 people and all our gear. Good thing, Nate and I are travel-sized because we have become experts at cramming ourselves in small spaces for long periods of time, and surprisingly even in very small spaces I can sleep as long as there is some sort of movement and a breeze.

Our 7-hour tour boat

We stayed in a regional guest house, which was pretty much like camping, but with a bed because there was no electricity and by the last few days our tanks of water were empty as was our gas tank, so we were fetching water and cooking on a small camping kerosene stove. However, the Guyanese people we were with were incredible cooks and really enjoyable to be around, so the amenities, or lack there of, really didn’t bother us at all. After our 8-hour journey, our group decided it would be nice to reward ourselves with a couple of cold beers and we all decided to head out to the nearest bar. Well…the nearest bar required us to board another smaller boat and ride along a river to a wooden building on stilts on the water. Pretty cool! The bar only had enough electricity to run a stereo, a cooler and one light bulb, but since there aren’t lights for miles, the sky was lit with stars and acted as our own personal disco ball. It was beautiful! And of course, they were blasting 90’s pop, which made the experience just that much better.

The view from our guest house and the rivers we traveled through.

The next two days we spent our time in the village of Waramuri, and met the first group of special needs children. So, before I talk a bit more in-depth about these children, I think it is important for me to explain what “special needs” consists of here in Guyana. Special needs back home, includes things like ADHD or dyslexia, rather than just physical challenges. However, here only children that have physical challenges are considered special needs, and many children that are autistic or ADHD etc are thought to have evil in them (we saw a mother literally trying to beat the demon out of her severely autistic 2 year old). Of course, these ideas are among the less educated individuals and not the health professionals or many of the trained teachers. The community members typically mock these children and indirectly force them to be kept locked up in their homes, never giving them the opportunity to learn or develop socially. Culture shock and heartbreaking to say the least! In Waramuri, we saw about 10 children who were blind, deaf, mute, had clubfoot, cerebral palsy, or were epileptic. We were able to get a comprehensive histogram on each child and find out whether they received any public assistance, which consists of $27.50 USD a month. I also gave a nutrition talk and Nate did two different trainings for teachers on “student engagement & teaching methodologies.” Our first talks weren’t raging successes, as we had hoped, as we are still learning how to be engaging in these presentations, without scaring our audiences with our loud American voices and fast-paced agendas. This is especially a challenge for me, who has the voice projection of a German dictator. A skill I was once proud of is now biting me in the butt. It’s all right though, I am learning to tone it down and Nate is already getting better at engaging teachers and not scaring them with all his questions, which here are often thought of as invasive.

Teacher Nate.

The following two days we did the same tasks with a new group of about 20 children in the village of Santa Rosa. Most of the children were not attending school, because there parents were ashamed, weren’t sure if they could learn, didn’t have a wheel chair and for this reason were bedridden or if they had a wheel chair the schools have no ramps or large enough doors for the student to enter the classroom. There were reason after reason and story after story that was heart wrenching. One in particular stood out that neither Nate nor I have been able to shake. About a year ago there was a young girl that was about 10 years old that had cerebral palsy. Her mother was opposed of her attending school, regardless of the fact that the young girl was very bright and had requested on numerous occasions to attend. After much convincing from the teachers and other health professionals, the mother agreed that she could go to school. On the first day of school, the young girl had to use the bathroom and took herself to the latrine where she fell in and drowned. They tried to get her out, but she couldn’t grab on to the rope and they didn’t have large enough vehicle to knock down the latrine in time. They just had to watch her struggle and die. I am still speechless and this is only one story. Deep breaths.

With some of the kids doing a self-esteem activity.

Even though our trip was not as productive as we would have hoped, Nate and I feel this was a good introduction and first step in working more with these children. Communities need to be educated on children and adults with disabilities and special needs, schools need to be accessible and safe for all children, teachers need to be trained in methods of working with children of special needs and most importantly these children need to be given at least a chance for a better life. We know of course, this is much more than either of us can chew, so right now we are trying to research and learn as much as possible on these disabilities so we can be advocates, and of course looking for funding to improve the state of these schools. One step at a time of course, there are a thousand issues that we want to fix, but we are trying to help in the ones that have the least amount of resources and support.

If anyone has any educational materials (teaching strategies, parenting strategies, community sensitization literature, etc) that are especially relevant to teachers/health care professionals working with students with special needs, they would be extremely helpful to us here. The best way for us to get them is either by email (Nate: n8stew@gmail.com, Ilana: ilae85@gmail.com) or by mail* (see address to the right).

Till next time.

*Items sent in a manila envelope reach us in about a month. It’s not uncommon for boxes to take 2 or 3 months to get to us, so if you’ve sent us a box and are wondering why we haven’t thanked you, it’s probably because we haven’t received it yet (except for Windham… we’ll just send that crap back marked “return to sender”).

Nesting...

Now that we have been sworn in as official PC volunteers our two years of service have officially begun. We have already spent three weeks in our permanent new home of Mabaruma, which is located in the northwest part of the country. We are so close to Venezuela that on a clear day we can see over the border, but since the border is just bush and come to think of it everything around us is bush, we really don’t know what we are looking at. However, Venezuela does have quite an influence in our area. The beer of Guyana is “Banks Beer,” but because of where we are everything that isn’t locally produced needs to be imported on a cargo boat that only comes once every two weeks, so its cheaper and more accessible to get beer from our neighbors, which is called “Polar Light” (Extra Refrescante…as it so nicely labels on the can). At the market you can buy empanadas, which are a bit different from Puerto Rico’s empanadas, I think the shell is made of corn meal, but they are still delicious and a wonderful reminder of home. Nate and I were so excited to see empanadas, that not only were fresh and hot, but were made with chicken (we don’t get to eat meat very often anymore) that we ate the empanada in front of the woman thanking her profusely, so much so that we made her blush. Needles to say, I think she just got weekly customers for the next two years. I’ll talk more about the market in a few, but first let me get back to Venezuela. There are glorious death-trap mini buses here too in Mabaruma, and the gas that fuels them is smuggled from Venezuela. There are no gas stations of course, so the buses will randomly stop in front of someone’s house and they will come out with a gallon of fuel and refill the buses and cars. It’s strange to me every time and always seems to catch me off guard. Even though we are so close to Venezuela, 10 miles to be exact, we never really hear anyone speaking Spanish. Funny thing is that when Nate and I speak in Spanish to one another, especially in the market when we are trying to discuss whether we think we are getting ripped off, people have no idea were to place us. They think we are Americans when we first walk up and then we speak Spanish and then they assume we are from Venezuela. It’s quite funny to see their expressions of total confusion, and I actually think it helps us when asking for prices.

OK so back to the market. The market, which is a cultural experience in itself, is located by the water and occurs every Tuesday and Saturday. Nate and I normally walk to the market, which takes about 20 minutes, and then take a mini bus back with our full bags. The market sells produce and dry goods, they also have “fresh” fish, but we haven’t ventured into buying fish that isn’t tuna in a can (just doesn’t seem sanitary.) Most produce is sold by the bunch and costs around 50 cents to a dollar. Produce that is grown in “Kumaka,” (that’s the name of the village the market is in) or in the surrounding areas is normally cheaper and readily available. These things are pumpkin, cucumbers, green beans, sweet potatoes, avocado, okra, green onions, onions, garlic, pineapple, bananas, bok choy, spinach, plantains and eggs. Produce that is shipped on the boat can be more expensive which ranges anywhere from two to three dollars and are available only on a limited basis. These things are carrots, tomatoes, cabbage, and CHESSE. But we definitely splurge and spend more money on these full market days. We don’t buy meat at all, due to how expensive it is and how it’s cut. Most “butchers” just take a cutlass (machete) to the chicken or beef and just hack away. So when you buy meat by the pound you have no idea what you might get. It’s a grab bag of fun; until you get chicken feet, cow face (I am not kidding, it was skin and meat off of the face of the cow), gizzards, tripe and bones galore. So we consume a mostly veggie diet and save our money to buy cheese whenever available. Half a pound of Cheddar cheese (the only cheese they have) is about $3. (As you can tell I am really missing cheese, so if anyone wants to send us grated Parmesan cheese feel free to…ohh and we will forever be in your debt). The dry goods are quite basic, like beans, noodles, rice, mac and cheese (not only is it mac and cheese, its Kraft mac and chesse), flour, sugar and condiments like mayo and mustard. Cooking is a challenge we overcome more and more everyday since we only have a limited supply of ingredients to make every meal. Some meals can be quite comical like guacamole and crackers but others are sometimes more elaborate like homemade pizza and mofungo, of course when ingredients are available. However, the produce is so fresh that even the most basic meals are delicious.

Our Kitchen

We have definitely been nesting in our new home. We have moved into a two-bedroom apartment located next to the hospital that is made of wood, concrete and aluminum. We have indoor plumbing, which means a flushing toilet and an actual shower. The water comes from the tanks outside of our house that collect rain water and has water pumped in from a reservoir every other day for an hour. Indoor plumbing is, without a doubt, a luxury. There is very limited water in the region, especially during the dry season, and it is necessary to conserve every drop. Our water situation has been quite an ordeal due to the families of frogs living in our tanks that had to be drained and cleaned and then the pipes we were counting on to refill our tanks were found to not be working properly. We spent the first week stealing water from our neighbors and doing everything with a bucket. We got down to using 5 buckets a day, including washing, cooking, showering and drinking. Pretty impressive if you ask me! I can now shower with half a bucket, well only if I am not washing my hair. Now our pipes and pumps are fixed, but most of the solutions are temporary so we will see. On the upside we get “current” (electricity…that’s what they call it here) for 20 hrs a day. We are hooked up to two different generators that split the day in half. Even though it can sometimes be quite noisy, nothing beats cold water and sleeping with a fan. We aren’t sure how long we will be living in this unit, because it is not finished. The floors still need to be puttied and shellacked to prevent the wood ants from the eating the boards, which right now they are having a feast. They have told us that the unit furthest away from the generator would be completed with the floors and eventually we can move into that one, but since we don’t know how long that will take and if it will even occur, we have made ourselves pretty at home. We have started to become accustomed to the daily creatures that visit us. Like our security system, the bull, which we have named “Bob,” who stands outside of our gate and bellows for about 30 minutes at dusk, our huge bat that we have named “Dracula” that flies through our house every night around 10pm and scares the living crap out of us, and the two roosters that start crowing a 6am and don’t stop till around 9am that I have so lovingly named “Shut the hell up.”

Our Bedroom.
(We have a guest bedroom that looks the same (*Hint Hint...come visit us! We will even give you the fan!))

Our Living/Dinning area equipped with not one, but two lavish hammocks!

We have a lot of land around our building and we are in the beginning stages of starting a garden. It was covered, I mean covered, in construction trash when we first moved in so we have spent hours picking up and burning trash. We have cleared up enough space that we have started to hoe a garden and have even planted some sunflowers (thanks Karen). We aren’t sure how successful it will be due to the amount of fowl and feral dogs running around, but we are optimistic, or at least hopeful, we can at least grow some herbs and some tomatoes.

See if you can spot yourself on our walls :)

Our nest is feeling more and more like home and we feel very lucky to be so welcomed into our community. Our front neighbor even plays pre-Johnny Cash country for our listening pleasure. ☺

Till next time.