The last month!

Oofda the last few weeks have been crazy! Lots of stuff to catch up on.

The weekend following Earl, Nick, Anna and I stayed at the Mayflower, a house the Peace Corps owns in Belmopan where PCV’s stay while they’re in the city. Friday we had pizza at one of the staff’s houses in Belmopan and watched the start of the Olympics, then got to go out and unwind in the city as a group, which was really great. It was something we all really needed after the crazy week that was Hurricane Earl, especially after being cooped up in the office all week. Loryann, Anna, Nick, Chelsea and I stayed at the Mayflower that night with Jason (forever will be J-Dawg to me after this weekend), the Peace Corps Volunteer Leader (PCVL) who’s been helping lead a lot of our training sessions. The other trainees stayed at various hotels and staff houses. Saturday, everyone went back to their sites except Nick, Anna and I. The rest of the weekend was a lot of hanging out with those two and J-Dawg, walking around Belmopan, and watching the Olympics – it was actually pretty great. Even better was that all 3 of us got news over the weekend that we’d be going home Monday. We were all ecstatic and ready to go back to our host families.

The next week was site assignment week, which was great for two reasons: moving back in with my host family and finding out where we’d be serving the next two years. My little sister, Mira, definitely missed me, which was awesome (and a ton of progress since day 1!) and we played a ton all week. She also really missed my flash drive with Frozen on it, so there’s that too. The week dragged a bit though leading up to site assignment since we all (well, most of us) were super anxious to find out where we were going. Site assignment day finally came and they made us wait until after lunch for it! It was pretty cool though. They made us leave the room for 15 minutes to setup the room, and when we came back, it was decked out with streamers and a big map of Belize. They would call us up one by one and announce our names and sites, and have us place our pictures on the map where our site was, and then read the next person in turn. I got placed in the Stann Creek district in Southern Belize, but due to Peace Corps safety and security rules, I’m not allowed to say exactly where on social media. If you want to know exactly where, feel free to ask me personally!

The next week we had counterpart workshop on Monday and Tuesday in San Ignacio, where we met our future counterparts. There I met Mr. Ical (my community health worker) and Mrs. Chiac (my principal) and we had two days of training with them. On Tuesday, I left with Mr. Ical to head down to my community (hell yeah!). Riding the bus down to Stann Creek was definitely an experience. I was told that you really need to fight your way onto the bus from the Belmopan terminal, but you never really know until you actually get there. I literally had to push my way through people to get out of the gate and we all squeezed through and made it onto a packed bus. I legit had to stoop on the bus for a few minutes since no one can be standing on the bus when it leaves the terminal. Then I was standing for about 45 minutes or so until a seat opened up that I could take, and rode the rest of the way to my village’s junction. We picked up another bus there after about 5 minutes and rode the 4 miles in to the village.

Let’s just call it Chaab’il k’aleb’aal (beautiful village), CK for short from now on, that’ll be way easier. Riding up to CK was literally breathtaking. Big tz’uul (mountains) covered in che (trees), mas li tz’ik (many birds), and red dirt everywhere. Seriously amazing. I was falling in love with CK on that first ride in. We got into the village and Mr. Ical (not only my CHW, but also my host grandfather) showed me to his house where I met his wife. Now let me tell you, my first experience in CK was meeting Xan Candelaria (Mrs. Candelaria), who happened to be topless making tortillas (xorok) in the kitchen without a care in the world. Big of a shocker right there, but I got over it pretty quick when I realized that she didn’t care at all, so I really shouldn’t either. We carried on talking in Q’eqchi for a bit, had some maatz (green corn porridge – DElicious) and then Mr. Ical showed me to my host family, his son Pablo. That’s when I met Pablo (inyaua – my host father), Fermina (his wife, inna – my host mother), and 5 younger children (wiiz’in) Venancio, Shereen, Wilfredo, Lizzany, and Anthony. Sarah, the previous volunteer in CK was also there since she was still in the village for another week or so. The welcome I got was absolutely amazing. They had me sit down and eat first (more maatz!), showed me my room with a big “Welcome to the Ical’s!” sign (awesome), and helped me setup my mosquito set and put a hammock in my room. We talked for awhile that night and then went to bed.

The next day I hung around with the fam all day, and in the afternoon Mr. Ical took me to meet the village chairman and show me around the village a bit, and I ate dinner at his house. I went home and chatted with my family at night and went to bed. The next few days would not be as calm as that first one was though, which was great! Over those next couple of days, I spent a lot of time playing and talking with my family, talking with Sarah, walking around the community, meeting people, experiencing Q’eqchi church (oh boy, that’s a thing), cleaning a community center, and playing with a bunch of the village kids. Okay, Q’eqchi church. 2-3 hours of church where there are a ton of hymns that everyone screams (yes, screams) to off-key and you can barely understand a word. They do say yuam a lot though, I did catch that, which means both body and life. It was actually really cool though. The community is really involved in church services, so lots of different people come up and speak or lead songs throughout the service, and Mr. Ical introduced me to everyone at the beginning, so that was pretty cool. My family goes Wednesday night, Friday night, Sunday morning and Sunday night, so I’m not sure I’ll do all of that, but I’ll probs at least go Sunday mornings.

About my new host family: in a word, they’re wonderful. Pablo is a farmer and Fermina stays at home with the kids. Ven is the oldest (14) and is super smart and a really cool kid. I taught him how to play Uno during the week and that was a lot of fun. Shereen (but we call her Sonida) is the next oldest) and is super nice and also really hard working. Then is Wilfredo (Fredo), who is really hard-working and always goes to the farm with Pablo. Next is Lizzany (Zany) who I swear is the cutest little girl y’all have ever seen in your life. She spent the week talking to me only in Q’eqchi, which was hard, but it helps to learn. Finally Anthony (Tony), is the youngest at 2 and is absolutely adorable. It took him about half a day to warm up to me and he was following me around everywhere and climbing into my hammock. I absolutely love these kids. They’re all super smart, fun and well-behaved, and already treat me like an older brother, it’s amazing. The day after I got back from site visit, Pablo texted me asking how I was and making sure I got home alright because Tony was worried about me. Freaking adorable. Mr. Ical, well, Augustine, is my grandpa and just an all-around awesome dude. He’s been a CHW for 31 years and is super knowledgeable, so he’s gonna be awesome to work with. My entire host family speaks both Q’eqchi and Mopan Maya (another Mayan language I’ll have to learn now), and Fredo and older all speak English as well. I already can’t wait to get back to them.

That being said, I also super love my Valley family. I don’t know how I got so lucky as to get 2 host families that are beyond amazing, but here we are. As excited as I am to get back to CK, I’m just as bummed about leaving Valley in my family here. Quite the back and forth really.

We got back from site visit that Saturday and had a busy weekend of re-integrating in Valley, doing laundry, hanging out with family, and helping to setup a football marathon at the village football field (baalil). We also setup a free blood pressure check booth there and ended up being at the field from 7am to around 3pm. Fair bit of work, pretty warm out, but a lot of fun. We got to hang out a bit, meet and talk with a bunch of people, and educate on healthy living. Pretty dang good day actually.

All this week was pretty down in the group though. Everyone was drained from site visit and re-integration into Valley, and some people didn’t have the greatest site visits unfortunately. Here’s hoping that everyone has an amazing round two when we go back in a few weeks though! The training has been up and down this week as well. Monday was alright, but Tuesday was super low energy all around. Wednesday we were supposed to have our final LPI and it got pushed back to Saturday last minute. Thursday was good though, and we found out we’re going to Xunatunich (a Mayan ruin) on Sunday, so that’ll be sweet. Friday is Kriol culture day (writing this on Thursday night right meow), so that should be fun as well.

The next few weeks are going to be absolutely crazy. 3 weeks from the day I wrote this (25/08/16) is swearing in (15/09/16); I still can’t believe it’s so soon. We have a couple of practicums over the next couple of weeks, a bunch of deliverables, some presentations, lots of planning (including a farewell party for our families though!), and very little time. Before we know it, we’ll be swearing in as official volunteers and I can’t wait!

Bryan

P.S. Here are some more pictures for y’all!

First tarantula I've seen/killed in Belize, in my room

Anna rocking her awesome hat and shades

(Left to right): Wren, Corley and Molly doling out our Hurricane Earl rations

Our standard meal during Earl in the office: Special K, chicken sausages, salines, peanut butter and orange jam

Nick painting Lindsey's nails

(Left to right): Megan, Florencio (our Q'eqchi teacher), Lindsey and Anda

Site assignment day!

Staff starting to announce site assignments

Site assignment map!

Family farm (1 of 2) where I helped plant corn!

Family farm (2 of 2)

My/family room with the roof off and on the ground post-Earl

The house my dad is building (helped a little bit pouring cement!)

Latrine and chicken coop

Kitchen and where I'm currently bathing (yep, from those big blue barrels)

Full view of my home in Valley, middle house is the family's shop

My room at the new site with a welcome sign my new host family made me!

Two of my new younger brothers, Anthony and Wilfredo (Fredo)

Lizzany (Zany) and Venancio (Ven)

Zany Ven and me in my room, Ven loves taking selfies

My host mom, Fermina, Zany and Anthony

Pictures from walking around my new community!

Anthony having fun with a pot lid

My host dad, Pablo, Anthony and Fermina

Anthony trying to hide behind my bed and mosquito net (pabayon)

My last younger sister, Shereen (Sonida) and Anthony

Grant checking BP at our booth at Valley's football marathon

Chatting around our booth

Tisha talking with someone after giving a BP check

Morris, Tisha and Ellen

Grace holding the play-doh poop (k'ot) for our diarrhea (k'otakil) presentation

Earl and His Wake

Ioos! (Yo-ss, also hello in Q’eqchi)

People have been asking me about when I’m going to post again, so here y’all go! Things have actually been pretty eventful since I posted last; it’s been a pretty crazy ride. Since the last post, we’ve kicked off our literacy night (Thursdays) and sports clinic (Saturdays), both which have been awesome, and our trash cleanup was great last Sunday. The two lit nights had 30+ and 20+ kids respectively, and they were both spectacular. The first night there was a mad rush at the end of the night to check out books (which we actually can no longer do without parental permission, really no shocker there). They were a little disappointed about that the next night, but they’ll be ready next time. The sports clinics were about the same. The first had 30+ and we played a bunch of games and ended with an hour of football. The kids here absolutely love football, it’s great. I’m crap at anything but keeper, but it’s still a lot of fun. The second time we had 15-20, and that was just as great. No football, but Grant brought out his slack line and the kids mega-loved that, so that was pretty sweet.

Training has been the usual, lots of long days, being tired all the time, and lots and lots of Q’eqchi. The language part is still the best by far though. We also have to do these practicums periodically where we present on topics that we’ve learned about through PST. The first we had to do was on maternal and child health, with our group presenting on antenatal care and birth, in as much Q’eqchi as we could (which was not a ton at this point). It was a big wakeup call for what we’d have to do when we’re in our villages, and how much there is yet to learn. The second was supposed to be Wednesday on either acute respiratory infections or diarrheal disease, with us having to do the same sort of thing with treatment and prevention of diarrheal diseases. The first went pretty well talking for 25 minutes on ANC, the second postponed due to Hurricane Earl, which I’ll get to later.

My host family has been amazing, though that has a really large and sad asterisk on it, which again I’ll get to later. I finally got to a point where I really felt integrated into the family. My relationship with my host mom was great, she loves playing jokes by lying hilariously about random things (chik chii) and then laughing about it. She knows I don’t care much for Coke/pop in general, so she thinks it’s super funny to ask if I want a Coke and then laugh about it, which is actually really funny. My host dad is great, we’ve always gotten along really well and it’s pretty cool being able to help out with random things around the house, learning stuff I never would’ve expected (like planting corn, building a house and fixing our road). My host sister finally realized I’m more than just a saq (white person/gringo), and actually talks to me and calls me by name now. We play a lot and have actually had a couple convos in Q’eqchi, which is absolutely amazing. She also randomly gives me parts of her snacks, which is simultaneously really sweet and super adorable. I absolutely love my host family.

Our second culture day was Mestizo and that was last Friday, and it was unfortunately kind of a bummer. The morning was alright and we actually learned a fair bit about the culture, which was cool, but the activities weren’t super engaging. It didn’t help that it rained a ton and all we all could think about was the second half of the day when we were supposed to go to a Mayan ruin, Xutantunich. Because of the onslaught of rain and how late the morning stuff dragged on, we couldn’t go unfortunately. Huge bummer to everyone, since we’d all been looking forward to it so much, both for the experience and because we’ve all been craving a break from PST and some time to get outside and have some fun. PST has been rough and it’s been getting to us all a little bit, so that was a rough situation. It could have been planned a little better in terms of timing, but really it wasn’t anyone’s fault. The one day we needed there to not be rain so we could do something super fun, there was a ton of it and we couldn’t go. Just means the next time we get the opportunity to go to a ruin will be that much better for the wait though.

Not much more eventful to write about until Hurricane Earl now. Practicum was supposed to be Wednesday, and that’s when things started to escalate. They postponed it opting to do our 2^nd technical interviews instead, which help determine our site placement. Meanwhile, those who were done or had later interviews went home to pack up in the event we had to consolidate in Belmopan. I had packed that morning with a few others, so it was a lot of waiting around before and after my interview. We got the official notice around 11 that we were being moved to Belmopan, since Earl had officially been upgraded from a tropical storm (less than 75 mph winds) to a category 1 hurricane, with the potential for it to upgrade to a category 2. We all split up to go home, eat lunch, and get ready to leave for Belmopan. This involved bagging up all of our stuff to prevent from severe water damage, taking 1 bag of essentials with us, and telling our families to take care and that we’d hopefully see them soon. I left saying taawil aawib (take care) and that I’d hopefully see them in 2 days, then left in the already light rain.

That was incredibly hard actually, because it felt so wrong to be leaving our families. Here we are coming to help out communities and live with them, only to say Peace Out when things get crazy. That being said, I really do get it, Peace Corps has a responsibility to keep us safe and I am very grateful for that, but that doesn’t make it any less difficult to do that. I expected to see my family in just 2 days time and with that in mind, left for the pickup site for us to go back to Belmopan to the Peace Corps office.

Hurricanes are some crazy things, but I’ll be honest, we all needed some consolidation time together (consolidarity 2016!), even given the circumstances. It was so nice to just be able to hang out for a night and not have to stress about training, integrating, studying, practicums, sleep, eating, illness, and really just everything about being a PCT. We also got to hang out with some COSing (close of service) volunteers and current PCV’s, which was spectacular. Every volunteer I’ve met is absolutely incredible, it’s kind of mind-blowing actually. I really get the Peace Corps bond thing now, especially with PCV’s who’ve served so long and just took us and as if we’d already known each other a long time. Plus being able to talk openly to everyone about literally (read: litRally) everything (yes, that includes poop, there’s actually a lot of talk about poop, it’s ridiculous how comfortable we are with each other) is really something else. Everyone is so nice, friendly, helpful, and all around wonderful. The support system here is actually ridonkulous, and that’s really, really good. Especially with the next part of the story about to come up.

Cue today. The storm was crazy, but we were all fine and had no issues short of a little flooding on the second floor in one room. We’re waiting around hoping to hear from families and wondering when we’ll get to go home to our host families, and most everyone’s heard by midday. I texted my family at 8 and hadn’t heard by noon, so I called. What I heard shook me up, but didn’t rock my world yet. Everyone was fine, which was the important part, but 2 of the 3 houses (the ones with thatch roofs) lost their thatch roofs. The 3^rd has a zinc roof, but many openings at the top, so that got hit too. Suddenly, my family has no home to sleep in and I don’t have a homestay home anymore. I’ll be honest, it was pretty devastating, but knowing my host family was okay was the biggest thing. I didn’t care about the non-essential stuff I’d had to leave at home, all that’s replaceable, but I did care about them and the idea of living with them the last 5-6 weeks of training. They were staying safely with family, but the house was in shambles. Thankfully, everyone’s families were safe and sound, so that was definitely a huge sigh of relief across the board.

I wasn’t the only one unfortunately, two others were in similar boats. We got called down to speak with Racquel, the host family coordinator, Anna, Nick and me. Being told to meet with her was immensely ominous, and I went down with the others holding my breath. Anna’s family lost part of the roof and part of a wall, but she could stay with her host brother, who was the backup Q’eqchi family, which is great, it just might take a couple days. No one could get ahold of Nick’s family, so that was up in the air. We found out later that two trees had fallen on their house and he was in the same boat as me, but everyone was okay. It was then I found out that there was not another backup Q’eqchi family, and my return to homestay was indefinite. That was the point I teared up, because this family that I’d been living with for 6 weeks was very likely no longer going to be my family. That was going to be hard enough in 5-6 weeks time when we were set to leave, but getting that ripped away so prematurely was beyond heartbreaking.  I’m not much of a crier, but I definitely did a little bit there, and I was teary-eyed for awhile after. Nick and Anna are stellar though and stayed down to hang out with me for awhile before we had to go back up. They’re going to try and find new host families for Nick and I to live with to go back to our communities, but I’ll be honest, that sounds harder to me that not going back at all. It would kill me to not go back to live in Valley the rest of my time in PST, but I think it would kill me more to go back with another family and have to say goodbye to two families in 5 weeks.

I was a wreck the rest of the afternoon, but everyone, and I mean everyone, is so incredibly wonderful here, that I felt so much support from all sides. Some of them went out of their way to buy us dinner and snacks to cheer us up, which was so incredibly thoughtful and we were so grateful and lost for words. We spent the rest of the night hanging out, talking, playing cards and cards against humanity, which was a blast. It really helped take my mind off of things and demonstrated how truly amazing these people are. I will never forget this day for multiple reasons, but the most glaring of which is that I love these people so very very much. By the time evening rolled around Nick and I were doing much better, rolling with the punches and treating this as just another Peace Corps challenge for us to get through. There’s nothing we can do from here except move forward. It’s still hard to think about and I’m still really sad about it, but I’m moving forward. We both are. At the end of it all, everyone’s families are safe and sound, and that’s the most important part.

Tomorrow we have some training and everyone goes back to their sites, except Nick and myself while the search begins, and maybe Anna depending on when she can go back as well. Tomorrow was also supposed to be our shadowing day, visiting a current PCV at their site for a day, and that was cancelled and another huge bummer, but understandable given the damage from Earl. Most of the country is fine and safe, but there was a lot of water, wind, down trees and flooding, so moving around is still tough. They’ll try to reschedule it, but there’s so little time left that while I hope that works out, I’m not sure it will. There are things to look forward to though. Just over a month of training left, and we find out our site assignments next Friday the 12^th, which we’re all super anxious about. We’re all ready to move on and get to our sites, but even that is bittersweet having to leave our first host families and each other until reconnect in December. Before we know it, it’ll be September 15 and we’ll be swearing in. It’s been a crazy few days and though it’s bound to not get much crazier than Earl and its wake, it’s sure to fly by even faster than the past 6 weeks have. If anything, we’re much closer now as a result of getting through all of this together, and I can honestly say that it’s something I will never forget.

So here we go - 1 week to site assignment, 2 to site visit, 5 weeks to be done with PST , and 6 to swear in and move to our permanent sites. Yo’o! (Let’s go!)

Bryan