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.

So much Swearing... In

On April 13, 2011, Nate and I were sworn in as the 23rd group of Peace Corps volunteers to serve in Guyana. Additionally, this year is the 50 anniversary of Peace Corps. We had a two-hour ceremony that occurred in Georgetown were our host families, community partners, health and education ministers, US ambassadors and all Peace Corps staff attended. Together with another PCV, Emily Berling, we represented our group by giving the volunteer remarks. Below is the speech Nate and I wrote and I presented.

~
One of the first things we heard off the plane was that the Peace Corps service was analogous with riding a roller coaster. Submitting our application was like purchasing a ticket for the ride, waiting was like…well, waiting in line. Some had a fast pass while others waited years to snag a seat. The excitement and anticipation of arriving in our new home of Guyana was like buckling in and riding the coaster to the first peak. But with any rollercoaster there are multiple peaks and falls.

Kennedy’s promise mentions that we are here to serve even in conditions of hardship. As many of us have already learned, there is no hardship too small that does not require adjustment and further adjustment. Some of these adjustments can be as simple as learning to love the smell of Mozipel for the sake of saving your skin from mosquitoes, that digestive issues is just your body’s way of adjusting to fresh food, and that embracing “smalling up” is just another way to further integrate with your community. However some hardships require more of us than we can bear by ourselves, and those are the times that give us the opportunity to lean on one other in our new family. In the short time we’ve been here the relationships we have formed with each other, our training team, counterparts and especially our host families have given us the support and knowledge we will need to be successful in the years to come. In our effort to develop sustainable projects --- these relationships will be what sustain us.

Although it is useful to use the analogy of how the Peace Corps service is like a roller coaster to explain the ups and downs, perhaps the way our service is different from a roller coaster is more important to note. On a roller coaster everyone’s path is pre-determined, the same highs and lows are experienced at the same time, and the gratifying feeling of finishing the ride may only last a few minutes. In the Peace Corps, although community partners and volunteers are all working toward a common goal, each of us is challenged to determine our own path to address our community’s needs. Our mission as community development professionals transcends the categories of health and education and we are empowered by the bonds we make with our community partners to facilitate growth in all aspects of human well being.

In the last 50 years over 200,000 volunteers have served in 139 countries and no two experiences have been the same and not forever life changing and gratifying. Today the world is more interconnected than it was 50 year ago and therefore it’s never been more important to have relationships based on mutual understanding and respect. We are privileged with the rare opportunity to serve as representatives of peace and carry on our nation’s tradition of service. We are honored to be the 23rd group of volunteers to serve in Guyana and deepen the bonds we have just begun to form.

Once again we would like thank our host families, community partners, trainers, Peace Corps staff and fellow volunteers. This experience and celebration could not have happened without everyone’s support.
~

With our first host mom Eslyn. She surprised us and brought us some beautiful hand-woven Baskets.

With our second host mom Debbie and her sister Nalini.

With Dr. Millie, who kept me alive and was instrumental in keeping me healthy for the last two months.

My JFK!

Ilana's speech at our Peace Corps swearing in ceremony.

Till next time

A little diddy

A few nights ago we had a family appreciate night where we celebrated our host families for taking us into their home even though we were complete strangers. Part of the night was a talent show where we volunteers got up to share our talents, which included things like juggling while singing a Guyanese song, self defense demonstration, the American national anthem, and of course a choreographed medley featuring Justin Bieber's "Baby." I wrote a song (which was originally intended for our swearing in ceremony but needed to be cut for time reasons) about training. Then a friend and fellow PCV, Seth McIntyre, helped me record it in studio room 202 of the Regency Hotel Georgetown.

Video from the talent show on Vimeo.

Here's the mp3:

Recording thanks to Seth.

Tomorrow we officially become part of the 50th class of Peace Corps volunteers!!!

Celebrating Rama Navami

Living in Guyana we get to experience many sub-cultures wrapped into one main Guyanese culture. One of the sub cultures that we’ve had the opportunity to get a good taste of is that of the Indo-Guyanese people. The reason for this is of course because our host mom is Indo-Guyanese, and she has made sure that we get to experience everything from her culture, which includes food, music, religion and of course Indian soap operas (which surprisingly there are a lot of). The majority of Indo-Guyanese are the descendants of the Indentured servants who were brought from (then) British India, to what was then called British Guiana to work in sugar cane plantations after the abolition of slavery in 1833. Indo-Guyanese are the largest ethnic group identified by the official census, making up 43.45% of the population and are primarily Hindus.


Even though our host mom is not Hindu most of her family and friends practice this religion and invited Nate and I to join them at their temple, which is called a Mandir, to partake in the religious holiday of Rama Navami. Rama Navami is a Hindu festival celebrating the birth of Lord Rama to King Dasharatha and Queen Kausalya of Ayodhya. They celebrate the holiday by having a service for nine nights which consists of chanting, offering of fruits and flowers, and an element of fasting, which for the Indo-Guyanese means not eating meat or any meat products like eggs and avoiding alcoholic beverages. At the end of each service a different family is the host of the Mandir and provides food and drink for the temple, usually consisting of some sort of curry and parsad, which looks and kinda tastes like cookie dough without the chocolate chips. However, before accepting the food you are supposed to drink milk that is poured in your hands. Funny story about this~ When we went to the Mandir the first night I was given milk in my hands to drink, but because I had no idea what I was supposed to do with this and the woman next to me said I was supposed to do this before eating the parsad, I for some reason assumed that “doing this” meant washing my hands. So…I starting washing my hands with the milk and Nate followed my lead. Oh boy! Quickly we realized that we were doing something wrong when the woman next to us starting laughing and our hands started to smell like sour milk. Needless to say, we made fools of ourselves! Oh well, certainly hasn’t been the first time and it will definitely not be the last time.



The temples are full of color and are absolutely beautiful. Adding to this beauty are the multiple colors of the women’s attire that I was so privileged to wear. I was able to have two outfits for each night of the Mandir. I was psyched to have multiple costume changes. Don’t judge me…you can still be a girly girl in the Peace Corps. The first night I wore a maroon colored Sari and on the second night I wore a mustard colored Salwar Kamee, which are loose fitting pants with a long dress shirt worn over the pants and a shawl. Married women are supposed to wear the shawl over their head. It was too hot, so I didn’t do this. The clothes are incredibly comfortable. In fact, they are so comfortable I wish I could buy a dozen of them and wear them all the time, even to sleep in. Nate, unfortunately, was not so lucky to have an outfit change and just wore khaki’s with a white shirt.

Thanks to Mahindra, Sunita, Patsy, Ram and Nalini for letting us tag along and participate in the nine days of Rama Navami.

Till next time.

Boom Boom there goes the Mini Bus

A couple of posts back I talked about the experience that is a mini bus, and I figured since this will be a daily occurrence it might be good to give you all a better mental picture of what these dare devil rides consist of. There are three different types of mini buses, which are called Boom Boom, Corkball, and Slingshots. Boom Boom buses are tricked out, no seriously, like what you would expect Snoop Dogg to show up in. The buses have nice rims with incredible photo-realistic art of poster girls on the inside of the buses. Most of the buses have different color lights that flash at night and some even have a small disco ball, so that maybe for just a few minutes you feel like you are in a club. The music they play is well…hysterical. Let’s see, a typical play list sounds some thing like this; 98 degrees, Celine Dion, Toni Braxton, Shakira, some sort of inappropriate chutney song talking about rum and girls, Britney Spears, Lean Rimes, some religious church song, an American Idol song and then Bob Marley or some reggae Creolese song. The music is blasted so loud you practically have to scream at the top of your lungs to get the “conductor” to stop at your location. Corkball buses are a bit more modest. They are not really “tricked out,” they have all the seats in pretty good condition, they have regular yellow or white lights to be able to see at night, instead of graffiti art featuring fairies and butterflies (oh yeah I didn’t mention that before) they have quotes such as “Only God I trust, all others must pay cash,” and they play music at a much lower level with a more focused 90’s pop play list. Slingshots, as I am sure you have already figured out, are the least nice buses and most of the time are missing a bench of seats, have no rims, breakdown on the side of the road pretty often and have no music. In other words, they are just a few more oil changes away from the junkyard.

Mini buses ride up and down the main street (really the only street) all day long and to stop them you have to stick out a finger pointing to the ground. Of course by using this method you never know which bus you are going to get. Once you get on, there is a “conductor” which could be a small child, a man, a woman, a grandma, etc. that opens and closes the bus door, collects your money and calls to the driver to stop at your location. But remember me saying that you practically have to yell to get the conductor to stop at your location, well I would say that 2 out of every 5 times they forget your stop and miss it. So they either will back track for you or make you get off a few meters past your stop. The tricky thing about conductors is that they love to rip you off, especially if you are white. We call it paying the “white tax.” Since there is no place that posts the fares for distances, you have to guess and often times have strong words with the conductor or driver about the correct fare, especially if it’s a location you have never been to and don’t really know the fare. Oh and they love to say that the fares change due to gas prices being raised, but once again there really is no way of knowing. This happens to Nate a lot more than it happens to me, I don’t know if it’s a gender thing or the fact that Nate is really white and well, they cant really figure out where I am from, so I have a bit more leeway…or so I think.

The interactions on the buses are probably the most interesting, but before I talk about this, I think its important for me to explain how reckless mini bus drivers are. Drivers honk at any and every person standing on the side of the road whether you have your finger out or not. Since they’re paid based on how many people they can deliver in the least amount of time, they drive as fast as the bus can go, which depends on the bus. Slingshots can’t usually go any faster than 40 mph, but the Boo Boom’s…well I have actually never looked at how fast they are going because well…what’s the point, if things are blurry when you are driving pass it you are probably going too fast. They also love to drive on the incoming traffic lane and pass one another. I feel like they are in a race that just never stops and the fastest mini bus I guess wins…who knows. Now add some cows, dogs, sheep running across the street and just for the hell of it throw in some rain and you have got yourself a real dare devil obstacle course. Exciting…right?

Back to social interactions on the bus; “smalling up” is a necessary survival tactic on mini buses, this means trying to get as small as possible so that instead of fitting 3 people on a bench, like the engineers intended, you can fit 8. “Doubling up” is also tons of fun, especially when 2 or three people sit on each other’s lap. I refuse to do this, I rather not be able to breathe because my face is smashed up against the side of the window than have someone sit on my lap or vice versa. And to top this incredible adrenaline rush ride of a lifetime (sarcasm), people love playing the uncomfortable staring game, which consists of staring at you like you have two heads for the ENTIRE ride! But trust me, its getting easier, well on days that I get a slingshot bus.

Till next time.