This post has no central theme and therefore no title, sorry.

I just completed 6 months in my site (9 months in the country), which means that one quarter of my service is already over. That is weird because although I feel like I’ve been away from family and friends for a long time, my work here is only just beginning. These first 6 months in site have been like running really fast on a treadmill at a steep incline. I’m working very hard at a very constant pace, very sweaty, and burning calories like crazy, but I haven’t really gone anywhere. One notable difference is that replacing those burnt calories with greasy rice and beans is difficult while running on a treadmill, but very easy in Costa Rica, so I’m not as buff or heart-healthy as I would be if all this running around was on a treadmill.

Peace Corps service lasts at least 2 years for good reason: the first year is about figuring out what the *$&% you are doing, forming relationships, and making mistakes, so that in your second year you are more comfortable about what you’re doing, utilizing the relationships formed, and learning from the mistakes previously made in order to facilitate community-based development that is (most importantly) sustainable. Teaching kids hip hop moves or giving a group of teens activities during the weekend are all fine and good, but let’s face it, the majority of my work right now is not sustainable when I leave. It is time to change gears.

In Peace Corps Costa Rica, our various projects are typically categorized on one of three levels: work with individuals, work with service providers, or work with community groups/organizations. Most of my work has been done on the individual level thus far, and while that type of work is lovely and most enjoyable for me, I can reach more people by training service providers and collaborating with community organizations. The past few weeks have been a whirlwind of getting more involved on the community group level.

I recently started working with a community development association, the members of which are introducing me to people in the municipality and other community leaders who have more pull (and access to funding) than the average Jose. I will be helping them to turn the community’s new basketball/soccer court (built with the help of the PC volunteer I replaced) into a multi-use space with a roof, electricity, water, etc. Not only will kids be able to keep playing during the rainy season, but we will be able to hold community dances, meetings, exercise classes, and a host of other activities with the new additions. They also want to construct a small computer lab with internet access and a playground so I will be supporting those projects as well in the new year.

The government just installed lights and a fence around the court which is to be locked every night to keep the area safe from up-to-no-gooders. This upset a group of young people who like to use the court at night. One group of young people started to vandalize part of the court in response to the new regulations, which is quite unfortunate, but the Association’s response was priceless. Instead of upping security and trying to catch the valdals and get them into trouble, they decided to invite all of the adolescents that hang out there at night to have a dinner on the court and talk to the Association members in order to come up with a peaceful solution and compromise. The (adult) members of the Association spend all afternoon cooking chicken and rice, and sure enough the teens showed up for the free food offer. The Association took advantage of their captive (and hungry) audience by laying out the problem and asking the young people for their input and support in coming to a peaceful resolution. The two groups came to an agreement on the hours during which the court would be open, and even made priority hours for littler and bigger kids. In the end everyone enjoyed dinner together and there haven’t been any more problems (knock on wood) since the meeting about 3 weeks ago. I loved the idea and the way it turned out.

My biggest project right now is organizing a Christmas Party for the children and families in the shantytown community near my house. The biggest challenge is obviously getting donations, because the community itself has zero funds. The municipality is going to give me a sound system and ice cream for the nearly 100 children. My youth group (which consists of adolescents who live in the shantytown) helped me deliver over 60 letters to different businesses in the area, so I’m hoping that at least 10 will actually come through and donate something. I am also trying to work with the company that is working on a HUGE hydroelectric project here in the south of Costa Rica to see if they will donate a toy to each child (they have a LOT of money for social projects because they are destroying so many communities and killing so much wildlife in the process of creating enough hydroelectricity to fuel the country’s rapidly growing need (it baffles me that we aren’t powering the country with solar power instead, but that is a whole other topic).

I have 2 weeks left of working as hard as I can before I take my first official vacation days to relax in the mountains with my 2 aunts, 1 uncle, 1 (and only) brother, and a partridge in a pear tree for Christmas. At the end of this week I will work with 4 other volunteers in the south to bring about 30 kids together for an activity called Arte por la Paz. Another volunteer and I will talk about the history of hip hop and how it started as a nonviolence movement of a young generation, and then teach the kids some choreography. Other volunteers will work with the kids on making/playing instruments and painting a peace mural. We have all been working with these groups in our own communities on different workshops related to themes of peace, and this event will be the culmination of their hard work. It should be (as we say in Costa Rica) “tuanis.”

Over vacation I will try to post about more specific projects that I have going on (a community service camp and the construction of 2 small walking bridges are 2 of the new ones), but for now my head hurts because they just fumigated the school to kill all the mosquitoes and stop the rapid spread of dengue which is taking over my town (as a mosquito flies right in front of my face). I can feel my brain getting smaller by the second as a result of the chemicals…que rico.

Peace, love, and pura vida!

Tico Time: Kevin (aka "Kevie")

I’ve decided to start including person profiles on this blog, so that in addition to my own personal stories, you also get a quick glimpse of different people in my community, straight from the horse’s mouth. For my first interview I was very lazy, and didn’t leave the house. Here’s what my 5 year old host nephew, Kevin, had to say to a host of random questions:

Do you like living in Costa Rica?
- Mmhmm

Why do you like living here?
- Because I like to live.

If you could be any animal what would it be?
- A tiger (he says with ZERO hesitation).

Why?
- Because tigers don’t bite.

Umm, tigers don’t bite, ever?
- No (like “you big dummy”), they just walk around up there, and when they hear something they put their heads up and listen, like this (he demonstrates).

What is your favorite food?
- Egg with rice

Do you like any fruits or vegetables?
- I like the apples you always have and when you give them to me. I do not eat broccoli or salad. And I like ice cream but mom says I can't have it now because I am sick and it will do damage to me. I can only eat hot ice cream.

Do you like having a gringa auntie?
- Do we have any hot ice cream?

No. Do you like having a gringa auntie?
- Yes, because I am happy all the time when you are here (as he buries his head in my pillow with embarrassment).

If an American child came to visit you here in Costa Rica, where would you take him?
- To Costa Rica, or to the United States

I then clarified the question…
- I would take him to pre-K, a forest, my house is nice, your house is nice, all of the houses are nice. To Mass at the church.

Have you ever been to Mass?
- No.

What is your favorite sport?
- Costa Rica (I’m sure he said this because the only sport he knows of is soccer, and this is obviously his favorite team).

What do kids here do for fun?
- Ride bikes, live in their houses, sleep at night, eat bananas, cereal…what else? Memeitos (these are like little corn chips), ice cream, popsicles, food, rice, rice pudding, beans, rice and beans, plantains, that one and the other one.

If you were a hot dog, and you were starving your you eat youself?
- Ummm, excuse me?

If you were a hot dog, and you were starving would you eat yourself?
- Ay Morgan (which sounds more like “Moah-ghan”), you really do say the dumbest things. Next question.

If you could take a trip anywhere, where would you go?
- To the mountain or the river (Yes, we live in a small, small world here, and I have never seen geography taught in any way, shape or form).

Well, you heard it here first, everything you could ever want to know about Costa Ricans. Now you know everything…you’re welcome.

Reuben

Last week a friend of mine lost her husband to leukemia. I just met him about a month ago, 8 days after he received his diagnosis, when my English students and I went to visit him. He was on bed rest and exhausted from chemo, but the state of his health did not shadow his glowing, positive attitude and caring, good-natured manner. I remember feeling so confused and sad and angry that this was happening to him, and could only think that he was going to get better – that there was no way he could leave us so soon. The other day I attended the Mass and funeral service held in his honor. Hundreds of people came to mourn and celebrate his life. Visiting Reuben in his house the one day I knew him, hearing the news of his death, attending his funeral and talking and being with his loved ones has filled me with more emotions than I am able to express in a normal blog post. I am not by any means a poet, and in fact this is the first time I have ever written a poem (if you can call it that) outside of school, but the night of his funeral I had an urgent need to write what I was thinking about, and it kind of manifested itself like this:

Never underestimate the power of first impressions.

I knew him for 30 minutes.

Smile so strong you’d never know he couldn’t lift himself from the bed.

He just received a death sentence but made me feel welcome and comfortable in his home (in his bedroom, actually). There was no reason for me to feel comfortable there. But I did.

Chances are the chemo won’t work, but there’s no way the cancer can survive while this father-of-five radiates positive energy so bright. Right?

Then I saw her. Just when I was sure he must be the strongest person in this world, I saw her. Ten weeks ago she gave birth to their baby boy. They thought blessings didn’t come any bigger than those four daughters, but now a son too? Things couldn’t get better. So they didn’t.

Anguish was behind her eyes, but hidden. Not because she felt like she had to hide it, but because it would not defeat her. She was too tough for that, and knew too well the needs of those kdis. She found refuge in her understanding that a Plan had already been made.

Chances are the chemo won’t work, but there’s no way the cancer can survive while this father-of-five radiates positive energy so bright. Right? Right???

One week later they moved him to San Juan de Dios.

I was saturated in doubt. Where’s the power of positive thinking? People’s heads hurt from all the positive thoughts sent to his family.

What happened to the power of prayer? The Buenos Aires air is thick in it, and my knees which never before knew a pew are bleeding after knowing this man. Why isn’t he getting better? I’m willing to forgive everyone and anyone for this horrible, metaphysical mistake, just fix it!

They told me he was in his final moments, but I was certain the good he exuded was too strong to die. When I arrived at Mass, I realized my ignorance. Of course it was too strong to die.

The church was saturated in his positive attitude, his love for his wife and children, the values he learned and passed on to others.

Her dark brown eyes were red from the pain, but they carried his light. Her tranquility was contagious, and put her children at ease. She controlled the room.
Her composure and calm allowed everyone to not only mourn but also celebrate life.

The illness may have taken his body but it was no match for his spirit, for it will remain forever in the hearts and minds of everyone who knew him. And I only knew him for 30 minutes.

That snake right by your foot can kill a cow…careful.

November 11, 2009

Big volcanoes, canopying over waterfalls, rappelling, mountain views, swimming in rivers, pineapple fields and poisonous snakes…these are among the adventures in store for you should you decide to visit me. We also have Dengue.

A couple of weeks ago I eagerly traveled to San Jose where I eagerly awaited the arrival of my friend Adam. I couldn’t believe it…my first true days of vacation in the 8 months that I’ve been here were about to begin! My brother came to visit in August, but bless his little heart I was working the entire time. This was going to be different. As soon as Adam arrived, we hopped on the first bus to Miramar, a small town in the mountains, northwest of San Jose near Puntarenas, with gorgeous views of the Nicoya Peninsula.

After a night as the only guests at the hotel/resort, our first day began with a 45 minute horseback ride through the mountains, to the start point of a canopy tour that involved 27 zip-lines over waterfalls.


The other people on the tour were really fun, and the guides were fantastic. We ended up getting a ride back to Puntarenas with one of them, which was amazing because I never get to travel in an actual rental car (I’m always stuck on a hot bus that smells like doo doo).


We ended up getting into San Jose too late to catch a bus to my site, so we stayed the night and traveled to my site first thing the next morning. Now I happen to love my jobs and my life here, but apparently following me around my site can be a little tiring. He bravely tried to communicate with my host family, helped me out in both English class with kindergarten and with my adult class, survived my exercise class, and waited patiently during several meetings. I set aside part of our last day to show him the swimming hole that my youth group took me to a few weeks ago. We had a great time and everything was very relaxing with the exception of a surprise visit from a very very long, fast snake. It jumped 3 feet in the air after we crossed it’s path, and then proceeded to slither into the river that we needed to cross in order to get home. The water was above knee height, and over very large, slippery rocks, so I was definitely uneasy trying to get across but we both made it alive and well. Later on we met up with a Tica friend of mine (who LOVES snakes) and when I described the snake to her she gasped and said, “Oooh, those are really really poisonous! They kill cows!” I may wait a while before heading back to that river.



Needless to say, after trying to get 5 days worth of work done in the 3 days that I would be home, Adam and I were both exhausted by the third day in my site, and ready for the more relaxing part of the vacation – La Fortuna, the town closest to Volcán Arenal. The largest volcano in Costa Rica, Arenal is definitely one of the biggest tourist spots in the country. It was my first time really being a tourist here, and I have to say I did not like it. In my town, I am accepted as a member of the community, and it is rare that people try to take advantage of me and my gringa-ness. In La Fortuna, however, they are used to gringos who have no idea what they are doing, and I hated the fact that I had to prove to everyone that I am familiar with the culture here in order to not be scammed or cheated. That being said, we had a great time visiting the volcano, visiting one of the largest waterfalls in CR, swimming in hot springs, going down waterslides that should be illegal, and walking around town to look at shops and try different restaurants (none of the food was a good as my Mama Tica’s).

I love having visitors but man it is hard when they leave! I get rather used to not having people from home around, but then when I get a little taste home I miss everything and everyone so much more when I am stripped of it once more. Don’t get me wrong, it is DEFINITELY worth the pain afterwards to have visitors, but bouncing back into my reality here is a little bit tricky.
Now I am back into the work scene full swing, trying to finish up projects before the end of the school year (December 22) and before my Aunts Mary and Margret, my Uncle Ed and my brother come to visit for their hottest Christmas ever (woot)!

So…like…what do you DO exactly???

I often write a lot about very little, instead of offering up how it is that I actually spend the majority of my time. So, here’s a little bit about a lot - a summary of the projects I have going on right now to give a slightly better answer to the popular question above.

Most of my days are spent walking (very fast, I’m told) from one place to another, doing work jobs that are often completely unrelated to each other. Here is a sample daily schedule, taken from Monday of this week:

5-5:30am: Wakeup, cook/eat a HUGE bowl of oatmeal with raisins and mango

5:30-6am: Cold shower, get dressed, gather materials for all projects for the day

6:20-6:30am: Walk to the elementary school

6:30-7am: Practice hip hop dance with my 5th graders who are not remotely ready for their 7am performance, but it will still be better than all the other performances (sorry, but it’s true)

7-8am: Perform with my kids because not enough students showed up, and watch the other performance for the acto civico (civics act)

8am-11:30am: Arrive 30 minutes late to the training at child protective services (which is okay because we don’t start until 30 minutes after I arrive), participate in the training, and apologize profusely that I cannot stay for juice and ham sandwiches with ALL the mayonnaise (I had planned on the training starting on time, which was just plain dumb of me)

11:30-11:50pm: Speed walk to the school (again), carrying an umbrella to protect me from the beaming, steaming, angry sun.

11:50-12pm: Quickly Coordinate with school counselor and 6th grade teachers regarding 5 antiviolence workshops that use art to promote peace

12-12:30pm: Help my group of high school girls with their costumes and makeup for a performance about values at the elementary school

12:30-1pm: Watch and assist with the performance

1-1:30: Walk/run home, put a boiled egg in my mouth and grab an apple (which was probably imported from the US and so it’s already soft and disappointing), change my clothes because I’ve been sweating too much already, grab materials for the rest of the day.

2-3pm: Hustle over to the place where I make copies (i.e. spend all my money), spend 30 minutes revising my diagnostic of the community (a 40 page document we write, in Spanish, to give to community members with whom we work), quickly plan English class, pick up my copies, and make my way over to the other elementary school, which is much smaller and has very few resources (see photo above).

3-5pm: Facilitate a meeting of Chicas Poderosas (Powerful Girls) with the 5th and 6th grade girls. Today is the first meeting, for which I spent most of the weekend planning and preparing materials. The project will last until the end of December, and each week includes activities about a different theme (e.g. leadership, communication skills, sexuality, gender, exercise and nutrition, boyfriends, working in a group, etc.).

5-5:30: Walk/run back to the first elementary school

5:30-7:30: Teach English to a group of adults/high school students

8:00pm: Arrive home and immediately grab jump rope and resistance bands

8-9pm: Workout in front of my host sister’s house because it is nice and hidden and people stop and watch me everywhere else. I’m sad because she is moving in 2 weeks!

9-9:30: Cold shower (feels sooooo good), eat a big bowl of beans, an egg cooked with cauliflower or green beans, and salad, and talk to host parents.

9:30-10:30: Go to my room and plan/prepare materials for tomorrow’s adventures

10:30-11: Read about 5 pages of whatever book I am currently reading (The Red Tent by Anita Diamant right now) before pass out with the fan on full blast.

Here are some of the projects I’m working on right now:

In the colegio (high school) I am still trying to finish up the mentor program. I am trying to start a women’s soccer team for next school year (which starts in February), so we’ll see how that goes. I also still have my 10th grade girl’s dance group. I’m teaching them hip hop right now, which would sound ridiculous to anyone in the States who has ever seen me dance hip hop, but here most kids have hardly even seen hip hop dance, so they don’t know that I’m terrible at it (and I’d like to keep it that way). The Patronato Nacional de la Infacia (PANI), or our equivalent to Child Protective Services, just asked me to choreograph a piece so my girls can perform at a huge recreation and cultural diversity event they are hosting.

In one of my elementary schools I just started a group called Chicas Poderosas, which originally created by another PC volunteer several years ago, and is now used throughout Peace Corps Costa Rica to empower 5th and 6th grade girls as they engage in a 12 weeks series of activities related to self-esteem, communication skills, sexuality, nutrition and exercise, working in groups, leadership, service, etc. The group I have is definitely more challenging than they are innocent and easy-going, but I like it that way, and think that if I can keep them engaged then they will benefit more from the program than would an easier group. The conditions in this school are completely unsatisfactory, which has also been a challenge. Yesterday I was left without a key (long story, but not my fault), so we had to get creative in order to find a meeting space. One of the walls of the cafeteria is much shorter than the others and is no longer enclosed with wire, so we had to throw one girl over the wall. She then found a small desk inside and climbed one of the tables to pass the desk over to us on the outside. We then used this desk to help get all of the other girls over the wall more easily, leaving me at the end to get the desk back over and haul myself over the wall. We then held a pretty successful meeting in the very wet, rainy, and muddy cafeteria, and then went outside to the muddy plaza where they taught me a bunch of games I had never played before, and ended with about 30 minutes of straight up foot races (bare foot races, of course, which involved removal of some pretty big thorns). And now I’m back to saying a lot about really little….

At the other elementary school I am working on a series of workshops called Art for Peace, which combine nonviolence teachings with art projects, and will end in a big regional event that is being organized by some volunteers who live about an hour away from me. I just finished teaching dance to a group of 5th graders for a school-wide civics performance, and I’m still of course teaching English to kindergarten every week. I taught them how to play “I Spy” today, which was a big hit. In one of my classes is a girl who is a girl who is quite high on the autism spectrum, and the understanding, patience, and sensitivity displayed by these 6 year olds in response to her needs is truly something to be admired.

In the shantytown my youth group is going strong. We went to the river the other day, and besides nearly giving me a heart attack every time one of them did a back flip off of a cliff, it was a wonderful time. They took me on about an hour-long walk deep into a valley and across a wirey bridge that has a sign warning that no more than 2 people cross at the same time, to a beautiful swimming hole where the water was deliciously cold. It is the first time I can remember being cold here. I took great pleasure in spending the day walking, swimming, laughing and eating cookies, with a group of kids who are smart, witty, fun, and full of energy. It is such a shame that most of them have dropped out of school, but I’m hoping that being a part of this group, which usually includes participation in nonformal educational activities, will inspire them to go back in February. Several of them have already told me that that’s their plan, so we’ll see what happens. My community meetings with the adults are less frequent these days but when they happen they are productive. Some ideas we are playing with right now: community fruit and vegetable garden, dance marathon at the colegio to raise funds they need for paperwork to apply for government housing, community bike ride to the river.

My adult English class has now started in full-swing. I teach twice a week, and even though I don’t typically like teaching English, this is the first group of people I met in my town, when I came to visit the volunteer I replaced, even before I knew I would eventually live here. They are incredibly motivated and wonderful company, so I love teaching them simply because it allows me to be in their company.

I’m still teaching exercise classes twice a week in the community center (or shack). I love all of my jobs, but this one might be my favorite because it relieves me of my stress while the others (wonderful as they are) often bring me a great deal of stress. I usually have about 20 people come to class, which I’m happy with because people here do not typically like to do exercise on purpose.

I’m trying to plan either a recreation camp (tennis, swimming, dance, basketball) or a triathlon camp for the end of January with one of the high-ups from the pineapple company here. Hopefully it will happen. I’m also starting to talk to the Community Development Association of a neighboring town, trying to see if I can get a playground built next to the basketball/soccer court that was initiated by the volunteer I replaced. More to come on both of those…..

Other smaller projects are always going on, but those are the biggies at the moment. Each day presents new little challenges, mistakes, and successes, and all of them build on each other in order to make this one gigantic learning experience. Okay, it is WAY past my 9pm bedtime, so this needs to end. If you made it this far in this blog entry I would like to congratulate you. Tuanis!

Hot Rica

As is typically the case in my town, it was real hot today. As I sit here sweating in my bed, unable to concentrate on work, I thought I’d write to you all about it.

You know you live in a hot place when…
…you sleep with an ice pack.

…you have to change your clothes at least 2 or 3 times a day from sweating so much.

…people who have lived there all their lives STILL complain about the heat constantly.

…it is 78 F and people are bundling up and talking about how cold it is.

…you don’t EVER miss (or even want to think about) having hot water.

…you are served hot soup or beans, and you have to put them in the refrigerator to cool them because they stay too hot at room temperature.

…freezers hardly ever fully freeze anything.

…you take a shower and the water that is freezing cold when it hits your head is warm by the time it gets to your legs and feet.

…you start sweating again even before stepping out of a cold shower.

…you have to wake up at 5am to exercise in remotely moderate temperatures because the sun is kickin’ by 6am.

…clothes hung out to dry are ready well before noon.

…not having a fan on you is like not having oxygen in the air.

…when comparing medical problems of PC volunteers in your country versus those in the rest of Latin America our medical officer says (and I quote): “As you can see we are winning in the ‘gina-cological’ conditions. That's probably because it's very hot and humid here."

Honesty is a virtue…right???

When it comes to commenting on one’s physical appearance, Americans tend to let their positive feelings be known, and to keep their critical opinions to themselves, or wait to talk about the person behind his/her back. Ticos, on the other hand, will not hesitate to comment on your physical appearance right to your face. I find it funny that in our Peace Corps training we learn that Tico culture is indirect, because I personally could not find them to be more direct. Obviously I am writing this because I have an example to share, and the story is actually very, very short. It goes like this: A friend of mine stopped by my house the other day after we hadn’t seen each other in about 2 weeks. Here’s how our conversation went:

Ana: Hi, how are you? What have you been doing lately?
Me: I’m good, just been working a lot. I’ve been sitting in front of the computer writing a huge report for the last couple of days.
Ana: Oh yea, I can tell you haven’t been exercising, cuz your face got all fat and stuff.
Me: Ummm…ok.

I mean, what can you say when someone says something is wrong with you face? Nothing, absolutely nothing. The thing is, I know she didn’t mean it to be offensive at all, but it just so happens they don’t tend to be offended when someone says they’re fatter, they just accept it, whereas we, well, do get offended. Here, telling someone they are fat is like us telling them they are wearing a green shirt – it’s not bad or good, it just is. Part of me wants to fully embrace the straight-up, brutally honest approach to body image, while the other part of me finds it to be a little unnecessary. Everyone is entitled to express their thoughts and feelings…I guess.

Mis Pollitos!

I love my job. This started out as a bunch of high school girls in my exercise class asking me to teach them the “Thriller” dance for their music class. Then they mixed Michael’s tune with contemporary music, and we worked together to make it fit the theme of “values” so as to enter their performance in a competition for “Arte por la Paz,” (Art for Peace), in which students of all ages from all over the country participate in arts-related projects that promote peace.

In this performance, one of the girls is having a nightmare that zombies (which represent violence in modern-day culture) are taking away her values and replacing them with anti-values, but I pretty much just had the memory card space for the Thriller part…you can just picture it all being very deep and stuff. Enjoy.

Those Magic Changes...

As I sit in my living room, watching two lizards run up and down the pale green wall next to me, and listening to another one make a screeching sound as it hides behind the map of the Americas above my head, I do not flinch. When I first encountered the little creatures, which find their way into each and every dwelling in my town and most others in Costa Rica, I was fascinated by them, and startled by their quick little steps and far-from-discrete nighttime noises. My newfound apathy for them is just one of many examples as to how my thoughts and behaviors have been altered by constant exposure to Tico life. So, I figured I’d just make a list off the top of my head of different ways in which my life or I have changed during these first 6 months in Costa Rica:

1. I eat just about every meal/food with a spoon instead of a fork and knife
2. I say “mamita” and “mi amor” on a regular basis
3. I brush my teeth about 4-5 times a day. I have always been a big fan of oral
hygiene, but here the norm is to bring toothbrush and toothpaste to work and
school, so that you can always brush after lunch and cafecito
4. Every day I speak more Spanish than I do English
5. I sweat ALL the time
6. People call me “machita” (“little blonde girl”)everywhere I go.
7. I eat a huge bowl of beans at EVERY lunch and dinner
8. All of my dirty clothes get washed and ironed every single day (I finally
convinced my host mom and sister that my workout clothes and underwear do not
need
to be ironed)
9. My clothes get ironed…period
10.Instead of running every day I jump rope every day (like Rocky)
11.I teach exercise and English classes
12.I live with little kids
13.People stare at me all the time (being a gringa here is kind of like being a
pretty circus freak)
14.God is referenced in nearly every conversation/social interaction I have
15.A group of high school girls asked me to teach them a choreographed dance (for
those who don’t know me, I would be an absolutely absurd candidate for such a job
in the States)
16.I wear business-casual clothing on a regular basis (who knew that my impressive
24 years of avoiding work clothes would come to an end during my Peace Corps
service)?
17.I am considered tall.
18.People offer me food all the time
19.I never pay for pineapple…cuz it’s everywhere.
20.I am an auntie

Ok, I could easily spend days adding to this list, there are just soooo many.

I Love My Little Brother

August 21, 2009

Hi party people, sorry for the delay in posts…I promise it’s not that I don’t think of you all often, it’s just that I live in the jungle (‘cept not really).

I am currently in my host sister’s house, where I’ve been sleeping the past couple of nights while her husband gets some tests done in the nearest hospital (which is an hour and a half away). She has a baby and a 5 year old son, and like many Ticos she does not like to be alone, so I’m keeping her company at night. She and her 2 sons are sleeping in her bed and I’m sleeping in the 5-year-old’s bed, which is, umm…let’s say…different. My feet just stay on at the end, so the fit is just fine, but the mattress is definitely just for show, because it doesn’t do anything. If sleeping on hard surfaces is as good as they say it is for one’s back, this kid is going to have the healthiest back there ever was. In any case, I’m happy that I can be here for my host sister, and I hope they can find out what’s going on with my host brother-in-law and get him home feeling better very soon. We definitely miss him around here. Also, I think his bed had bedbugs, which is disgusting, but I definitely woke up with, uhh, problems (I’ll leave it at that).

I cannot believe that I haven’t written in a month! A lot has happened since then of course, the highlight being my little brother’s visit, which sadly ended last week. After 5 months without seeing each other, neither one of us could believe that we were actually together. On the day of his arrival I went to San Jose to meet him at the airport, and my bus was making extremely good time (we were going to arrive in 4 rather than 5 hours). That is, until it smashed into a pickup truck that pulled out in front of us. After seeing glass fly everywhere outside of the bus (we were all fine, hardly even felt it), I heard about 5 or 6 more vehicles smashing into each other behind us, which was pretty scary. After hearing that everyone was miraculously okay, I boarded another bus and carried on to San Jose, thankfully still getting to the airport on time. It was so wonderful to see my favorite boy in the whole world, and his Irish-Catholic whiteness was beyond blinding. I mean, this boy is W-H-I-T-E! I have never felt so tan in my life as I did during his trip. It was fabulous.

So as not to waste any time in the miserable city of San Jose, we immediately set off for a beach located about 2 hours from where I live. This came as a surprise to my brother, who thought we were only going to my site and San Jose (I’m so sneaky). Although it rained our entire full day at the beach, we still had a good time catching up and just being together. During one downpour I decided I wanted to try running (which I haven’t been able to do since January due to an injury), so we set out into the rainy jungle to see how it would go. The scenery was so beautiful that it wasn’t until we were a couple of miles in that I realized I was not, in fact, ready to run yet.

The next day we set off to my site, which was certainly the best part of his stay in my opinion (and I think he would agree). I loved introducing him to my friends and family here. Everyone was quite impressed by his Spanish, and it was nice to see how happy he was to be putting it into practice. My host mom was thrilled to have someone who could eat an entire table full of food (so she proceeded to fill the entire table for him at every meal). She nearly died of embarrassment when my brother insisted on helping wash the dishes, but it was a good opportunity to show the anti-machismo ways of my family in the States.

We stayed in my site for 6 days and 5 nights, and my brother got to experience my daily life to the fullest. He took my exercise classes in the Baptist church and in the community center, attended meetings in the high school and with various community members, helped paint traditional masks with a group of kids in the elementary school, entertained the younger kids who showed up to my meeting for adolescents in the shantytown, sipped cafecito, and ate lots and lots of traditional Tico foods. The pic at the top of this post is from the hike we went on with my mentorship program from the high school. My brother is the large white one.

His last week here was unfortunately consumed by a conference that I had in San Jose. The conference was about service learning and solitary volunteerism, and how to introduce these concepts to our communities.

Community service is generally a good thing, but its impact is much more profound when 1) the project idea comes from the people who will benefit 2) the volunteers and community are informed about the project, including its origins, consequences, and future steps to maintain or improve its effects. These are the kinds of components that separate “community service” projects (e.g. taking a science class to a river to pick up trash) from “service learning” projects (asking a science class to analyze the strengths and weaknesses of their community, seeing that they identify the dirty river as a primary concern, teaching them about how rivers affect communities and the consequences of contamination, taking those who are interested to the river to clean it, and meeting afterwards to celebrate the project’s success and to form a plan of action to keep the river clean). While community service is something that is valued by many people in the U.S. (so much so that an entire government institution - Peace Corps - is dedicated to its implementation in countries all over the world), it is not a common value here. This is not to say that Ticos are not generous nor that they do not want to help others – they are by far the most generous people I have ever met – but rather that the idea of community service is not something that has not yet infiltrated the culture. Peace Corps Costa Rica has made service learning a primary concern, with the ultimate goal-of-goals being the implementation of a corps of Tico volunteers who work for Ticos (i.e. the equivalent of AmeriCorps in the U.S., but in Costa Rica).

In any case, it was too bad that my brother had to come to the conference with me and my community counterpart (the high school counselor), but the 3 of us had a good time together along with the other 14 volunteers and their counterparts, and I learned a lot about how to work more effectively in my community. It would be awesome to see the creation of a Tico Corps in the coming years.

No, gracias.

July 21, 2009

“Viejo verde,” which literally means “green, elderly man,” is the name Ticos have bestowed upon older men who spend their days in heavy pursuit of younger women’s affections. Besides the occasional brief encounter, I haven’t really been bothered by these tortured souls…until this week, that is. I’m not sure why (it may be the new deodorant I just bought, which smells fabulous), but I managed to have my fair share of viejo verde encounters in just these past three days. The first is an employee in one of the institutions for which I work, which is always fun. Every time I see him, he tries to make plans for the two of us to go see some waterfalls that are a couple hours away from our town. Anytime I mention anyone else who might like to go too, he assures me that they have already seen them. So far, my indirect attempts to tell him “no, gracias” have been insufficient in ending the repetitive proposals. Yesterday he decided to try and work “I live alone, I have no woman” into each one of his terribly uninteresting stories, and proceeded to ask me about my marital status. I told him all about my “very serious boyfriend” in the States (we’ll call him, Tommy), and when he asked how long Tommy would wait for me I very confidently responded, “forever.” Tommy and I are very happy together.

My other viejo verde is even worse. Unfortunately, when I first him I was not thinking clearly, and told him I did not have a boyfriend (although I’m pretty sure it wouldn’t have mattered to him). I was minding my own business, walking home from the center of town, when he spotted me. He asked for a minute of my time, which happens constantly here, and it wasn’t until 5 minutes into the conversation that I realized he was tryna be someone’s sugar daddy. After several unsuccessful attempts to find out exactly where I live, what my phone number is, and when we could see each other again (because apparently this first “date” of ours went so well), he settled on giving me his phone number (which I keep with me always…), and finally allowed me to escape his oppressive charms. Not only did he have no “verguenza” or shame in asking me ALL the personal questions, he saw no problem in telling me that he has always wanted to marry a “White (not Black)” girl from the States. He would have been in luck if I had always dreamt of marrying an old, unfaithful, racist turd…but that just isn’t my type. I had the pleasure of seeing him again today, but I was mentally prepared for his aggressiveness, and was able to get myself out of the situation relatively quickly.

Overall, the men here have been very respectful towards me, and I feel extremely safe in my community. There just always seems to be a few bad apples in every bunch (mmm…apples). Speaking of apples, the other day I bought the best ones I’ve had in Costa Rica, which nearly produced tears of joy. Not only that, but I also bought natural peanut butter (in the town an hour away), so you can imagine my excitement when I was able to eat the natural peanut butter with my crispy, perfect apples. It was heaven. Yes, mom, I already finished the jar of PB that you sent me, but it brought many people (and by that I mean me and my host mom…no one else likes it) lots of happiness.

Everything here is good, the kids just had a bonus, third week of winter break due to sudden, increased outbreaks of swine flu in children here. I am looking forward to school getting back in session, not only because the kids here need all the time they can get in school (they attend classes for about half the time of students in the States), but also because it is a lot easier to get work done on projects when people are in their normal routine.

I have official news of my first visitor from home. My brother, who apparently loves me more than any of the rest of you, is coming in just a couple of weeks! I am stoked to see him, and cannot wait for everyone in my community to meet the nicest boy in the entire world!

Machismo and Generosity

July 10, 2009

This week I started about five different blog posts, and then erased them after feeling unable to articulate the meaningfulness of the experiences I was attempting to share. Here I’d like to share two characteristics of Tico culture with which I am confronted every day – one negative (Tico machismo) and the other negative (Tico generosity).

- When I was in training, I only had minor exposure to the “machista” or patriarchic culture that is so prevalent in Latin America (Costa Rica being no exception). Since arriving to my site, machismo punches me in the face on a regular basis, and it often takes all my energy to contain my frustration. For example, my host sister really wants to come to my exercise classes, but can’t because her husband gets home from work during class….I you are like me you might be asking, “Who the @!#$ cares?” If you are my host sister, however, you care because your husband’s dinner needs to be hot and ready the moment he gets home. When my host sister told me this was why she couldn’t come to class, all I could do was stare at her. The notion that, twice a week, this 30-year-old man could not find some other solution to eating dinner (e.g. wait an extra hour, make it himself, heat up something that she already made) left me dumbfounded. What’s even more is that I was with my host mother and other host sister, and both of them (of course) shared the “poor Warner needs his dinner so obviously Jamie can’t go” point of view. Same thing happens in the morning – she can’t walk with me and my other friend because pobrecito Warner needs to have his freakin’ breakfast. Lawd help him if anything (heaven forbid) were to happen to my host sister. Sometimes I wonder if the men here even manage to wipe themselves in the bathroom. One more quick example of my host brother’s machista ways: Just now, my abuelo was calling for my host mom (his daughter). I was in my room, and heard him, but Warner was literally right next to him, laying on the couch. Warner managed to let out a pathetic call to my host mom to let her know, but when that didn’t work he just gave up and let my abuelo continue to call her in his weak, elderly voice. Hardly able to believe what I was hearing, I emerged from my room, confirmed that this was actually happening, and asked abuelo what he needed. Unbelievable. Side note: My host Dad is super helpful around the house, which I love love love. He is so incredibly generous and treats my host mom with all the love and respect in the world. He is definitely the exception, not the rule.

- The other day, I was about to walk home from a nearby shantytown when a ferocious lightning storm emerged out of nowhere. I ducked into the house of a woman I know, seeing as bolts literally seemed to be hitting the tops of the tin roofs that surrounded me. My friend, Marta, doesn’t have enough money to pay someone to make another hole behind her house to use as a bathroom, but she still managed to bring me a bowl full of shopped up papaya in a matter of 5 minutes. I was thankful for the lightening storm, because I allowed me a full hour of nonstop conversation with her and family that would not have happened otherwise. In addition to the papaya, my hands were full with a loaf of homemade bread and ice cream from 2 others families before I made it out of the shantytown community. Although I still feel guilty when people who are struggling to survive give me (the gringa who has everything she could ever ask for) presents, I am beginning to accept the fact that pleasing other people genuinely pleases them – the fact that they are able to offer something to others breeds a sense of pride, and assurance that they are going to be alright. I am confronted by Tico generosity on multiple occasions every day, and yet it still never ceases to amaze me.

The generosity displayed by community members in the shantytown, and the machismo so beautifully demonstrated by my brother-in-law are merely two examples out of the many that catch my attention on literally a daily basis.

Today involved hiking to the top of a mountain, serious jump-roping, teaching an exercise class, and eating lots of arroz con leche with coconut cookies. Needless to say, it is time to go to sleep. Next week I’m helping Jenna run a swim camp in our town, so that should be fun…or really painful and stressfull…but interesting none the less. I’ll letcha know all about it. Send me emails, it is really depressing if I go a week without internet and then when I finally get access my only emails are from Peace Corps, Bank of America, and my mom. Thank you.

Showing off my blogging skillz...this is a video

This is pretty much how my nephew and I spend our free time...I try to do work, and then he comes and distracts me and acts too cute for me to turn him away. Here he is ¨reading¨Beauty and the Beast, and talking about how the Beast wants to eat children who don´t behave themselves....

Everybody Poops

No matter how hard some people try to deny it, everybody poops. Many of us have the luxury of flushing a toilet afterward, which is really pretty awesome if you think about it. Sometimes, the magical process of flushing is interrupted, and a clog in the toilet occurs. Although this can make a person sad, there is something called a plunger that can make everything all better. The real problem occurs when there is no plunger. This was my situation this morning. Sometimes Abuelo (grandpa) forgets that here in Costa Rica we do not put toilet paper in the toilet. This is interesting to me, because he has never lived anywhere else, but bless his little heart, he does it anyway. Today, I fell victim to following him in the bathroom, which means the toilet clogged after I was finished.

Given that we do not have a plunger, I walked 10 minutes to my aunt's house to borrow hers. No problem, right? Wrong. First of all, I needed to be at the school teaching Kindergarten in 20 minutes, and still hadn't showered after working out. Second of all, by the time I got the plunger it was covered in poop from the last time my aunt's family had used it. Third, when I finally got to my house to use it, it was of course the worst plunger ever made. It was stiff, and flipped inside out with every plunge, splattering EVERYTHING everywhere. As if turning inside out didn't spatter enough nasty-ness everywhere, it was even worse trying to get the thing right side out again. I finally got it to work, and went on with my day.

What's my point? Not surprisingly, I don't really have one. No, wait, I got it - this is just one of millions of examples of how everything takes sooooo much longer here, which is something I'm trying to get used to. Although I think it's lovely that people are much more "tranquilo" here, it does not always agree with my super-Type-A personality...but I'm trying to become more Type-T (Tico).

I am, however, going to buy a plunger for my family this afternoon. There are some things that I don't really want to develop more patience for, and fixing a toilet clog is one of those things.

Feliz Dia, Papacitos!

June 21, 2009

¡Buenas! Feliz Día del Padre (Happy Father’s Day) everyone!

Although Mother’s Day is not celebrated until August here, Father’s Day this year was celebrated on the same day as in the States. We had a whole mess of people over today to celebrate, which was a lot of fun (see photo for the mess of people). My host Dad (the short, happy gentleman who is farthest to the right in the photo) could not be more adorable, and I absolutely love our relationship. Today I made him and my host brother-in-law (and the rest of the family) chocolate and banana pancakes, which they obviously loved. None of them had ever had pancakes or maple syrup before, so they it was kind of a big deal. The other day I introduced them to peanut butter, which might have been the most significant cultural information that I have shared with anyone at this point. I plan to spread my love for peanut butter all over this country. Here you can find small jars of it in big supermarkets, but hardly anyone actually buys it because it just isn’t part of the culture (and it’s expensive). I’m going to start making it my just putting a bunch of peanuts in the blender. I’ve become partial to peanut butter and guayanaba jelly sandwiches here. Guayanaba is a super common fruit here, and if you can find guayanaba jelly in the States then I highly recommend it. Guayanaba jelly is to Ticos what strawberry jam is to people in the States…everyone has it. There are so many fruits and vegetables here that are not available in the States, and I know them well now because, unlike in San Jose, here in Buenos Aires I get to eat food with… (wait for it)…nutrients!!! I actually get a little sad when other people invite me to eat meals with them, because it is never as good as the stuff I get at home. Come visit me and try it for yourself, contact your travel agent today.

So, I haven’t written in a while because I’ve been very busy making the world a better place. Actually, I’ve been busy trying not to screw up while taking over projects while the volunteer who I’m replacing is out of town. This week, I taught English classes by myself for the first time, which was scary. People go to college for 4 years or more in order to learn how to teach English as a second language, and that is the way it should be. My second class was certainly better than the first (which was just short of disastrous), so I’m hoping they will just keep getting better. I also teach English to 3 kindergarten classes, which is the cutest thing ever. First of all, they are in kindergarten, which automatically makes them adorable. Second, as if the little blue dresses that all the girls wear weren’t precious enough, the little boys wear smocks - that’s right - SMOCKS!!! If you are not familiar with the “smock,” it is like a normal boy’s collared shirt, but the bottom part has a little skirt on it, and they wear them with little blue shorts. I’ve got to take a picture of them – you will die of adorableness poisoning for sure.

I’ll never get through this post if I don’t just sum up some of the other stuff that went on this past week:

- I led a community meeting with residents of the ghetto that is close to where I live, which went extremely well. Last week I created a community survey in order to collect baseline data regarding their living situations, but because a large number of the residents cannot read I ended up spending hours individually interviewing people, which was better because I learned a lot more about each family. Every now and then I run into someone from the community and they tell me that someone else in their family wants to meet me, so I often have lengthy, impromptu visits to the community as well. I have so much respect for the people who are living in the conditions over there…I honestly don’t know if I would be strong enough to do it and still remain sane.

- My exercise classes are going really well, although I’m still spending hours preparing for them in order to get a handle on the exercise vocabulary, which is not exactly something I’ve had the opportunity to study before. I’ve decided that making people sweat, walk funny, and feel really good about themselves at the same time is one of my favorite things in the world.

- Still keeping up my morning walks with a couple of women who are trying to get started in the world of exercise. The one who has been walking with me since I arrived said she’s lost 15 kilos and can wear all kinds of old clothes that she hasn’t worn in years. I am very proud of her.

Okay, talking about work is boring, here are some random thoughts:

- I am trying to master salsa, swing, bachata, meregue, and cumbia…I received a crash course from two of my coworkers at the high school the other day…hoping to be a pro by 2011.

- My coworker at the high school invited me to her neice’s quincernera (15^th bday party), which was a lot of fun, and in true Tico fashion I was welcomed into their family with open arms. I was invited to spend a weekend with about 5 different families, and my coworkers sister even invited me to her wedding next week. People are SOOOO nice here!

- The water company here keeps shutting off the water because it’s the rainy season so it’s more vulnerable to contamination. I really like water a lot, not just to drink but also to cook, bathe, flush the toilet, wash my hands after using the toilet…the list goes on. As you can probably imagine, I get pretty sad when it goes away.

- I am in heaven with my new host family. Yesterday I spent the day about an hour away in Perez Zeledon, and when I got home at night my 21 and 23 year old host sisters practically tackled me as they ran over to greet me and tell me how much everyone missed me (I was gone from 11am until about 9pm). I also got eaten alive my mosquitos and these other little “bichos” (bugs) that are balck and really small but make big red bites that are twice their own size. I hate them…hate them. My legs are all swollen and look diseased and it kind of hurts to walk. Oh, my trip to Perez was super fun though. I went to my coworker’s niece’s quinciñera (15^th bday party).

- Today marks the third time that my host family has forced me to sing karaoke to Celine Dion’s “My Heart Will Go On.” They don’t actually force me, but these people are so sweet that it is basically impossible to say no to them. Also, they do not play when it comes to karaoke…it is unfortunately something about which they are genuinely (and painfully) passionate.

- Next time you are eating salted peanuts, sprinkle some lime over top, eat them, and then send me a pretty thank you card. You’re welcome.

- Ticos use the word “culantro,” pronounced “koo-lan-trow” instead of cilantro. It’s funny because it sounds a lot like the bad word for butt, “culo.”

- Tuanis (pronounced too-AH-neese) is a word to describe something as being really good, but in a cool way. It’s like “awesome,” but with actual street cred. Apparently, the word evolved from English-speaking people on the Cariibean side of the country saying “too nice.” I try to use it as frequently as possible.

That’s a little taste of just some of the things going on in my head right now…I’d love to hear from everyone so keep me updated with emails. I’m hoping to have a cell phone in the next week, so email me if you want my number, and if I actually know who you are I’ll send it to you.

Tuanis.