Wednesday, December 28, 2016
Friday, December 23, 2016
6 months in country...you're kidding me, right?
Sorry for the really long delay in posting – things have
been pretty crazy the last couple of months, and about a month out of it I was
laptop-less as my charger broke and I had to wait for the new one to get here.
Hopefully there won’t be such a delay in posting one again! A lot of things
have happened since I last posted! I’ve been in country 6 months now, 3 of
which have been at site. We had our reconnect training a couple weeks ago, so I
got to see everyone again (which was amazing, I love BH4 so much). Anyway,
there’s a lot to cover in all of that!
An overview of some of the things that have been going on
since I last wrote. I’ve been in the school a lot more since the teachers’
strike is over, and my goal was to shadow all of the teachers at least once (16
teachers!). I’ve now down that, and have started teaching HFLE (Health and
Family Life Education) lessons, which is what my job will be in the school.
I’ve taught 3 at this point – anger management (awesome), being a part of a
community (okay), and products used to take good care of the body (good).
Hopefully I’ll start teaching more as time goes on, but only time will tell on
that. I’ve also started tutoring Standard 6 (8th grade) kids in Math
and English to get ready for the PSE (Primary School Examination – High School
entrance exam) on Wednesdays. I’ve only been able to teach a couple so far, but
it’s been going well. Done some home visits with my CHW now, those are okay but
they’ll get better, need to get into the swing of things there, hopefully. I
found out he’s planning on retiring in March, so who knows what will happen the
next few months. There is a new CHW that’s been elected already, though I
haven’t met her and she hasn’t started training yet, so who knows how that will
go. That should actually (hopefully) be really nice when that begins to work
itself out. One of the most frustrating things about being here so far is that
it’s really hard to connect with the adult women of the village, especially
because my current CHW is male and goes to the farm during the days, and as an
adult male I can’t go do home visits alone to the women of the village when
their husbands aren’t home. It totally makes sense, and I wouldn’t care much
for a stranger coming to my house visiting my wife while I wasn’t home if I
were them, but it makes it hard when I can’t do any work in the mornings unless
I’m at school. I can walk around the village and talk to the people that hail
me, but it doesn’t happen all too often and I often just end up heading back
home. I’ve been trying to figure out work here, but it’s been challenging the
last couple months figuring things out. With my current CHW retiring, we
haven’t done much in the way of community health education, and while I’ve been
in the school a lot, it’s been mostly helping out here and there around the
office rather than teaching a lot. The bit that I’ve done so far I’ve enjoyed a
ton though, so I’m looking forward to more. The longer I’m here, the more I
realize I’m going to have to start going out of my way to reach out to the
teachers to try and help teach in their classes more. I think that’s the way
it’s going to go with community health education too – I need to go out and
find some people that really want to work on health projects here and reach out
to them to get started. One of the things I learned from reconnect is how vital
it is to have counterparts that want to work with you in the community, so I
need to find some more to really get started here. I have done a lot of needs
assessments here though, so there’s plenty I know of that could use working on.
It’s encouraging to know that I can definitely help here; I just need to find
the people that I can work with next.
Some of the cooler things I’ve been doing in the last two
months though…A bunch of doctors came in one day from the org School Bells,
which is an awesome mission that comes to Belize 1-2x a year to help out with
education and health. I got to help them register patients in Q’eqchi, and help
translate some (GREAT practice). I actually helped translate a consultation to
a man in Q’eqchi explaining his symptoms, likely cause (gallbladder! that was
interesting but actually went well), that he needed an ultrasound at the
hospital, to stop eating as much spicy food, and his prescription order. That
was awesome experience actually, and it was a full day of that, so a lot of
great practice. Morris (another PCV near me) and I started doing health
education at one of the nearby clinics in Independence, first one on
hypertension, and that went alright. It’s a cool experience though. I helped
out with a Special Olympics Belize event in Dangriga that was a lot of fun, and
got to hang out there with Yanni and Anna afterwards, which made for a really
great day. The day after that trip with the Harvest at one of the churches in
my village, which is basically the equivalent of Thanksgiving here. They set up
a bunch of tables at one of the churches, and the students march in with a
donation of food to sell and raise money for the school, and perform a bible
verse, song or speech. The skit thing was really cool, the market after was
crazy, but it was fun being able to help out with that. November 19 was Garifuna
Settlement Day, which is a big holiday here celebrating the arrival of the
Garifuna people in Belize. The day before, we had a culture day at the school
in the morning, where all the classes performed skits, songs, or poems to
celebrate different cultures. In the afternoon, we did sports day, so I got to
play football with the kids and softball with the teachers all afternoon. All
in all, a spectacular day. On Nov 22 I had Thanksgiving dinner here with my
backup host family and a couple of missionaries for the Church of Christ here that
come every year around that time to celebrate. I helped cook a little bit and
we had chicken pot pie soup, which was amazing. Gonna need to make that again.
Dec 4 I went to a birthday party at one of the nearby villages and had a blast
there playing with the kids and swimming in the river all day. They slaughtered
a pig and made an absolute TON of caldo. I’ll be honest, you don’t want to be
around for a pig slaughter, but the food was delicious. After that was reconnect
with my cohort at this amazing resort in Burrel Boom, and that was an
interesting experience. It was amazing seeing everyone again after so long, weird
being at a place with hot water and giant beds, hard hearing about the
successes others are having when you’re having challenges in those areas, but
cool to talk about and hear all the successes that everyone was having, and a
little rough being back in 8-5 training again (the memory of PST is still too
real for that to have been okay, haha). Overall it was good though, and I left
feeling motivated to get back to my village and work, and I absolutely loved
seeing everyone. The 13th was had our Christmas Pageant at the
school, and I got to play Santa Clause. That was an absolute blast, and yes
there are pictures and videos, haha. The 16th was the first night we
were officially allowed to stay outside of the village for a night, so a
handful of us went down to PG for the night and had a blast hanging out down
there. This week I went to the farm and carried a big bag of corn for a mile
down a muddy hill and then attempted to ride a bike the 4 miles home with it on
my handlebars. That was interesting, haha. That’s about where I am now as I’m
writing this.
This weekend is Christmas and it’ll be only my 2nd
Christmas spent away from home, and I like it about as much now as I did then,
which is to say, not really at all. In case any of you didn’t know this about
me, I absolutely love Christmas. It’s by far my favorite holiday, and I hate
spending it away from home. I’m one of those awful people that start playing
Christmas music in September/October, and I have a Spotify playlist almost 200
songs deep that I usually go through at least a few times by Christmas. I know many
of y’all think it’s a travesty to play it before Thanksgiving, which is fair,
but I can’t wait that long. Because of that, it’s been a little tougher here
lately. At the same time, it’ll be cool to experience Christmas here in a
different culture at least once since I’m planning on going home for Christmas
next year. I also love my host family here, so it’s an opportunity to spend
more time with them during what’s also a really big holiday here. Still, it’s
hard not being at home right now.
On a more positive note, things to look forward to! I’ll be
spending New Years on Caye Caulker (one of the beautiful resort-y islands here)
with most of my cohort, which will be a blast. There will be pictures to come I’m
sure. I got official approval to come home in July for Jackie’s wedding in
July, so I’m looking at flights back home next summer. That being said, it’ll
only be for a week so I can save my leave for Christmas next year, but I’ll be
home for a little bit! In January I’ll be starting a blog challenge the Peace
Corps put out, so I’ll be posting about once a week for at least a month. They’ll
give me a prompt to write on each week, so hopefully that’ll make up a little
bit for my lack of posting these last two months! Finally, on the picture
front. I need at least halfway decent internet for me to post pictures on this
blog, which is hard to come by. That being said, I’m not posting any pictures
this time, but I hope to in the next couple of weeks. I have a ton lined up to
post, so the next post will likely be only pictures! Now for some fun stuff. In
the spirit of fellow BH4 Volunteer Eileen, I’m going to copy her and tell you a
little bit about my host family here because they’re wonderful.
Pablo
Pablo is my host dad, and is absolutely hysterical. He’s
incredibly hard-working, tireless, and is always smiling and cracking jokes.
His favorite way to mess with me (which we both this is hilarious) is to mimic
the neighbors calling me to play football, even though we both know it’s him.
“Mr. Bryan!! Yo’o chi ballib!” in a fake voice he makes up. He works at a
nearby banana farm, so he brings bananas home a lot, which is super great. He’s
also really smart…actually my whole fam is.
Fermina
xMin (pronounced Shmeen) is a rockstah mom. For real. Pablo
goes out to work, but she runs the house. With 5 kids here, plus me and Pablo,
that’s not easy task. The oldest kid is 14, the youngest just turned 3, and she
cooks (ah-MA-zing food), cleans, washes clothes, and generally just does
everything, and is always smiling while doing it. She’s harsh when she needs to
be, but she’s super sweet and loving. Also, she makes the best Caldo I’ve had
in Belize, which is flipping spectacular given how much I mega-love Caldo.
Venancio
Ven is my oldest host brother at 14, he’s in 2nd
Form (Sophomore year of HS) and is a smart kid. He always wants to play
football (and usually kicks my butt), is hilarious, likes playing jokes, and is
all around just a really good kid. He once took my phone and edited a picture I
took to write “I love you” on it, which I absolutely lost it to.
Shereen
Senaida (not sure why, but that’s what everyone calls her)
is 11 and is basically 2nd in command for running the house with xMin.
Super sweet and smart, but she likes to mess around with people too. She’ll
walk casually by into the kitchen and poke me in the side if I’m not paying
attention to make me jump and then run away laughing.
Wilfredo
Fredo is basically a little monkey and will climb anything,
at least until he fell and broke his wrist during my first month here. He still
runs around everywhere making sounds like he’s The Flash though. He’s 9 and can
be rude sometimes, but he’s a good kid, and he’s smart too, super curious about
everything.
Lizany
Zany is an adorable, super energetic 7 year old who always
wants to play cards, no matter what. She asks me probably every single day, and
doesn’t like to stop until she wins. Won’t say anything when she loses but
“Let’s go again” and then gloat like crazy when she wins, it’s hilarious.
Anthony
Tony is my super adorable 3 year old brother who is always
running around, hugging or tickling me, asking where I’m going and if I’m doing
well in Q’eqchi, and is always asking what everything is. He’s 3 and can speak
Q’eqchi, understand Maya, and is learning some English, it’s nuts. This kid is
already super smart, and he’s so flipping cute.
My family is wonderful here, I really do love them. It’s
interesting though, there are a lot of languages going on in this house.
Fermina is Mopan, speaks Q’eqchi to Pablo and me, Mopan to the kids and me, and
Kriol/English to me. Pablo is Q’eqchi and speaks either Q’eqchi or
Kriol/English to everyone. The kids can all speak Q’eqchi, understand (and most
speak) Mopan, most speak English/Kriol, and some speak a bit of Spanish. It’s
crazy. For the first month I had no idea which language xMin was speaking in,
but now I know based on what she’s saying if I know the words, or who she’s
talking to. My Q’eqchi is coming along though, so that helps a lot. I can
understand Kriol for the most part, and I’m slowly learning a few words here
and there in Mopan. They’re a ton of fun though, and I feel super welcome here.
Anyway, I think that’s all for now, this was a super long
post. Look forward to a lot more posts in January, and the next one should be
up soon with a ton of pictures!
Bryan
Sunday, October 23, 2016
A Month in CK: "Rubella", Ups and Downs, and Maybe Dengue?
Dyoos!
Picking up where I left off a month ago (crazy it’s been a
month already, right?), a lot has happened here in CK. First thing first is the
fact that I’ve been living here for about a month and a half now. It’s nuts to
me that it’s been that long, we’re about halfway to our 3 month reconnect
conference. Can’t pretend I’m not looking forward to seeing all the other
volunteers again. It’s pretty wild how close you can get to a group of people
in such a short amount of time through training, and having that ripped away
when we all left for site was pretty tough, so I can’t wait to see them all
again. I’ve been able to see a few people here and there, but only people that
live in Southern Belize like I do.
So when I last wrote, I’d been in my village for about a
week and nothing crazy had happened. I’d gone to the farm and experienced
Belizean Independence Day. Well, things turned up quickly after that with the
“rubella epidemic” that happened in my village. I’ll get to why there are
quotes there later. There was an outbreak of full body rash and fever going
around the village like wildfire, and we had one confirmed case of rubella in
my village, and another in the Cayo district. Since there have been 0 cases of
rubella in the past 15 years, 1 case was enough to be an epidemic, let alone 2.
Because of that, the two weeks following the farm were a whirlwind of activity
working with the rural health nurse, Ministry of Health, and Vector Control to
try and figure things out. We gave out tons of MMR vaccines, did a bunch of
education sessions on rubella, went house to house to interview people, and I
met with a bunch of senior public health people from my district (that part was
pretty cool actually). Even got to throw my (brand new, finally official) MPH 2
cents in at one of the meetings, which was pretty cool since I’m actually
getting to use my degree a bit already! Well, after two weeks of all that
craziness, we found out that the 2nd blood sample from the first
rubella case came back negative, so it wasn’t actually rubella at all, same
with the 2nd case. Bright side is, basically the whole village has
gotten their MMR vaccines now, including all the school-age kids and teachers.
Dark side, it could have been any of the crazy vector-borne illnesses endemic
here (dengue, Zika, Chikungunya, malaria), and there’s a chance I may have
actually had dengue. Who knows, hopefully will be finding out soon. If it did
have it, it was super mild, so that’s good.
While this was all going on though, I started working in the
school a little bit. The principal introduced me to the entire school at a
Monday morning assembly, and told me about 2 minutes before it was about to
happen. So I do, and then she says that I’ll speak a little bit in Q’eqchi to
the folks that speak Q’eqchi, which I also wasn’t expecting. It was actually
pretty cool being able to do that though, and after that, basically all the
kids in the community knew my name. My little brother Fredo also managed to
break his wrist around this time too, so one of my days was spent at the
hospital with him and my host dad. Again around the same time, I started
learning Q’eqchi again with my language tutor here, which actually happens to
be Cecilia (mentioned in the last post), who is also my host aunt (ikana se
Q’eqchi). It’s been good starting to learn again, and have had a couple
sessions with her already. I think it’s getting better, but who knows. Some
days it feels like learning the language is going really well, some days it
feels like it’s going terribly. I’ve been told a few times I know a lot already
and that I learn quickly, so I think it is going well overall.
Other things that have been going on…Well I’ve been in the
school shadowing a little bit. There was a big teacher’s strike here though
that lasted about 2 weeks, during which time I couldn’t really get into the
school at all to shadow. I actually ended up going one day to try, and got
asked if I was there to help out, to which I of course said yes! They put me in
a classroom and asked me to supervise the kids doing their workbooks for the
morning, so I figured okay, it’ll be like a study hall, that’s fine. Turns out,
the kids had no workbooks or homework at all, so nothing for them to do or for
me to supervise. So I ended up teaching them all morning instead of sending
them home or just sitting there the whole time. It was an interesting
experience, and after having barely shadowed and never really teaching kids
before, it was like jumping straight into the fire learning how to do it. No
lesson plan either because of the strike, so I had to wing it for a few hours
until lunch. It went alright I think, but it’s not something that will be
happening again. I’m only supposed to be co-teaching health education and not
subbing, but now I know what to expect in that situation and it won’t be
happening again. Still, it was a heck of a learning experience.
We also do a mobile clinic here in the village on the first
Wednesday of every month, so I helped out with that at the beginning of October
and got to see how that worked. Busy day helping pull health cards, filling out
height and weight, checking blood pressure, and helping organize things for the
nurses. I also got the chance to attend a Community Health Worker (CHW) meeting
in Dangriga the day after that, and that was interesting too. Kind of a long
day, but they fed us lunch (chicken, pig tail, rice and beans and coleslaw),
and we got to learn about some of the resources available to us, so that was
good. Day after that I made it down to Punta Gorda (PG) to meet up with the
Q’eqchi Qrew, which was a fantastic time. It was so good seeing everyone after
weeks of being apart from them, and PG is a cool little town right on the sea.
It felt great to relax a little bit and catch up, and I really enjoyed PG,
gonna be going there a lot I think.
The week after that was probably my roughest week since
coming to site. I went to a village council meeting and met everyone that
Sunday, which was good, but that was about all that was good until the end of
the week. With the strike in full swing, I couldn’t do much of anything during
the mornings, and in the afternoons it rained a lot, so I didn’t go out at all.
I was also sick for a couple days with wicked headaches and pain behind the
eyes (a week after my full body rash and why I think maybe dengue). So it was a
lot of being bored, resting, and being sick. That Friday I went back to PG
again after feeling a bit better, and it was
great to hang out with the QQ again.
That brings me to last week, when things really started to
pick up around here! Sunday I went to Otoxha with the Baptist church, which is
about a 5 hour bus ride each way. I got up around 2:30 am to go with them, and
got home around 7pm. It was an interesting day, a lot of it very awkward and
uncomfortable with a lot of people referring to me as saq (white/gringo in
Q’eqchi), which isn’t super fun. Hopefully that’ll dissipate over time. Got to
speak a fair bit of Q’eqchi that day though, which was good, and Otoxha is
super beautiful. Monday I spent the day working on a lot of things, getting a
head start on the report I have to do for the PC that’s due in December.
Tuesday I walked around the village and met a bunch of people in the morning,
then had language tutoring in the afternoon. Wednesday I was at the health post
all morning helping out with a Ministry of Health focus group session on some
of the materials they’re producing about available health services in Belize.
Thursday I spent the day at the Independence clinic shadowing there, and they
want Morris and I to come back there on Fridays to do health education in the
lobby for the patients, so that’ll be really cool. Friday I finally got back
into the school again to shadow in the morning with the strike ending this
week, and in the afternoon I did home visits with Mr. Ical, the CHW. Spent a
lot of time talking about hygiene, sanitation, hand washing, and a fair bit
about exclusive breastfeeding! It wasn’t exactly what I expected, but it was a
cool experience. We have to do 12 of those a month, and we did 6 last week, so
we’ll do 6 more this week. Saturday I got to go to Placencia, which was beyond
amazing. It’s absolutely gorgeous there, and we spent a lot of time by the
beach, eating, and walking around. I had really, really good coffee for the
first time in 4 months, and I’d legit forgotten how amazing coffee could be
(having drunk instant for the past 4 months…). I didn’t take a ton of pictures
this time, but I’ll be back many times I think, and will take more next time
I’m there. It was super relaxing and a ton of fun, and it was a nice way to
recharge before starting next week off.
Overall, things are going really well and I love it here.
Things aren’t always easy, and there are so many people to meet, and so much to
learn about the languages still. My host family is a little crazy sometimes,
but they’re so much fun and I love them. It’s not always super exciting, but
that’s the way it goes, and I try to keep busy as much as I can. Things won’t
be great all the time, but that’s just how it goes, and it’s fine. Things in
general have been really, really good though.
Here are some highlights from the first month or so in CK:
·
Tried sardines for the first time, that was pretty
interesting actually, I kind of enjoyed them!
Made tortillas with my family a couple of times now and
they’re actually getting better
Fam finally let me wash dishes once!
Learned how to wash my clothes by hand in the creek, not a
huge fan, but I gotta do it
Made a fool of myself learning how to chop the yard with a
machete and shell corn, still not super good at either yet, haha
Got a big log of firewood dropped on my shoulder by a drunk
guy - that was a weird, crazy, drama-filled experience that hopefully will not
be repeated. No worries on the shoulder front, just a wicked bruise thankfully
Been reading a ton down here (13 down already, most of the
way through 14 right now), and that number includes re-reading the entire HP
series
The food here is amazing, and I eat a ton, but my family
asked me yesterday if I’ve lost weight…so that’s a thing I guess. I do walk a
ton here and try to run, so it is what it is
I’ve effectively gotten over my hatred of pictures, because
you kind of just get used to it down here. Not sure if that’s a PC thing, a
Belize thing or both. Either way I take a ton of pictures now and don’t care if
I’m in them anymore. You’re welcome Sarah and Amanda, haha
I play football (soccer) with the kids here a lot and I love
it…actually getting a little bit better at it (I think?)
Been taking people’s blood pressure a lot, so I’ve gotten
pretty good at doing that, which is a random skill to have
Belize is really beautiful, come down and visit me sometime!
Until next time!
Bryan
P.S. No pictures this time, sorry! Maybe next time!
Saturday, September 24, 2016
The Last Month!
Welp, it’s been almost a month since my last post, so the
whole every 2 weeks or so thing has kind of gone out the window. Since then, a
lot has happened.
Starting from my last post, we had Kriol culture day on
Friday, August 26th, which would be our last culture day. It was
actually an absolute blast – the best culture day we’ve had by far. They fed us
as soon as we got there with some traditional Kriol breakfast food – Kriol
bread, fried jacks and coffee, it was great. They showed us some traditional
Kriol dancing and singing, which was actually a ton of fun. I’ll throw some
pictures at the bottom, but one of my favorite photos here so far is a close up
a friend took of me doing the plantation dance with a hat of leaves on my head.
After that, they showed us how to make traditional mosquito swatters out of
bush sticks, how they roast cashews, and how they make tongs out of bush sticks
as well. After that we had a Kriol lunch of rice and beans, chicken, pig tail.
Pig tail is a little weird, but it’s alright. We saw some awesome woodworking
after that, learned about Kriol culture, took a walk through the bush and saw
some howler monkeys, and then drummed and danced the rest of the afternoon. It
was a ton of fun, but we were all exhausted by the end of the day.
The next day was Xuntantunich, which is the Mayan ruin we
were supposed to go to about a month prior that didn’t work out. Super glad PC
managed to make it happen, but it was both super gorgeous and a ton of fun. We
had all morning there to just walk around and hangout – pictures below.
Afterwards we went to this place called Benny’s to eat in the nearby town, and
I swear to God it was some of the best BBQ I’ve ever had. Yes, that includes
Sweet Cheeks and Soulfire back in Boston.
The next two weeks after that were kind of a blur. Training
was really ramping up since it was the end of August and Swearing In was set
for September 15. We had a bunch of practicums and presentations for prep for,
packing, and planning our host family farewell celebration. Nothing much too
exciting going on there except that one of our practicums was about healthy
cooking, so we got to make some bomb breakfast burritos that was incredibly
delicious, and my mouth is watering just thinking about it now. Our last week
in Valley was that 2nd week, which was really sad actually. We had a
bunch of planning that week, taught in one of the schools in Valley (which was
actually a lot of fun), put on a health fair in the community and had all the
kids show up (thanks to Sarah for that one!), and then had our host family
farewell on Saturday. That was actually a ton of fun and everything went super
well, which was great to see after a ton of planning. We even managed to have
just the right amount of food, which never happens. After that, we all split
off to finish packing and spend a last night with our families. The next day we
left Valley at 2pm, and I’ll be honest, I definitely cried. I told myself I
wasn’t going to, and I would’ve made it if my host dad hadn’t come out crying
himself and hugged me. He gave me a k’oxtal (a hand-woven Q’eqchi bag that men
use to hold their corn when planting) and said he really got just to having me
around. That’s about as close as you can get to a Q’eqchi man saying that he’ll
miss you, so I lost it at that. That morning we sort of hung around and went to
the grandparents for lunch before leaving. Mira and I played all morning which
was fantastic, but when Vial went to drop me off, neither of them would look at
me before driving away. As sad as that was though, it was the start of getting
ready to going to CK, beginning with a week in Belmopan for Swearing In with
almost the entire cohort (love you Lindsey, we miss you).
Belmopan week was, in a word, spectacular. It was a last
little bit of training, getting ready for swearing in, and 21 of us in a hotel
for 5 days actually getting to hang out and unwind. It was also really
bittersweet at the same time though, since we’d be saying goodbye to each other
for 3 months come Friday when we all left for our sites. About a bajillion
wonderful conversations and heart-to-hearts and a ton of crying by all of us
later, we’d eventually leave.
Swearing In though. That was a thing. The Wednesday of
Belmopan Week we went to San Ignacio again to practice the ceremony and do another
counterpart workshop. Fairly boring stuff, but SI is beautiful and the hotel is
super nice. Plus it has an iguana preserve, so that’s pretty great. Thursday
itself was Swearing In, and the ceremony itself is fairly long, but it’s pretty
cool. It was actually really surreal officially becoming a Peace Corps
Volunteer after 3 months of intense training and over 2 decades of the idea
having been in my head. We also had 1 person from each of the 3 language groups
(Spanish, Kriol and Q’eqchi) give a thank you speech, and I got to do the
Q’eqchi one. Oishee and Nicole both killed it in Kriol and Spanish
respectively, and was told mine went well also. After Swearing In, we had lunch
at the hotel, and while I was super bummed my family couldn’t make it, I had a
blast sitting with Nick, Yanni, and Oishee’s families, who were all Kriol. We
eventually made it back to the hotel and got ready to head off again. We’d all
been invited to the U.S Ambassador to Belize’s house (thanks honorable judge
Carlos Moreno!), which was insanely nice, and technically made us be “back in
the United States” for a couple hours. After some great apps, we headed back to
the hotel to get ready for our last night out in Belmopan together. I’ll leave
it at the fact that it was a wonderful (late) night with lots of dancing and a
few tears. The next morning we all left for our sites and we all cried a ton as
we split off to catch our separate buses.
That was last Friday, and since then, I’ve been living in CK
and mega-loving it. Things are definitely hard sometimes, especially because
while Q’eqchi has been coming along well, I by no means know anywhere close to
everything. I can communicate fairly well most of the time, but it’s still hard
to understand a lot of the time. That’s been the biggest challenge though, the
rest has been great. I got here on Friday, and pretty much just hung around
with family all weekend long. Lots of sitting around talking, playing with the
kids, and learning as much as I possibly can. Saturday I went into the bush to
cut firewood with the fam and played football with the kids. I went to Q’eqchi
church on Sunday morning, and it was even longer this time, but at least it
wasn’t at night this time so I wasn’t exhausted and trying to stay awake this
time. Monday we went to the creek and I learned how to wash my clothes by hand,
which I’m pretty sure I did about half right. Some of my clothes came out
smelling alright! I also saw 4 scarlet macaws there, and they were gorgeous. Tuesday
I went to the school for their Independence Rally. Independence Day here is
September 21, but since it’s a national holiday, the schools are closed that
day and so they did their celebration a day early. It was really great actually
- each of the classes performed a skit, song, poem, or dance on a stage the
teachers made outside the school. Then they all went on a parade around town,
it was a great morning. In the afternoon I went to the community center
(hereafter just referred to as the center) for a talk from the District Health
Educator about Rubella, which is going around here. Turns out my host dad is
just getting over it, and my host brother Ven had it last week. Monday and
Tuesday my host sister Zenida was teaching me to sing in Q’eqchi, which was a
lot of fun. They also made me sing some stuff in English as well, including the
Star Spangled Banner. I love singing, but I’ve never been a fan of when it’s a
small group of people all staring at you. PC is one big exercise in feeling
awkward a lot, so I’m kind of starting to get over that.
Wednesday (the day I’m writing this) I went to the farm all
day. Up at 5:30am and back around 3:00pm and despite sunscreen, I got burned
again. I’m on doxy now for anti-malarial meds because the chloroquine was
messing with my being able to sleep, and one of the side effects is sensitivity
to the sun. As if my pasty whiteness wasn’t bad enough in the sun already,
haha. Turns out the farm is a 4-5 mile walk from CK, so I definitely got way
more than my fair share of steps in today. I could have ridden a bike, but PC
doesn’t let us unless we have a helmet (PSA: wear your helmets y’all), and I
didn’t think I was going to get a bike out here so I didn’t check one out.
Stupid me. Good exercise though I suppose! (PSA: walking is good for your
heart!) It was also a beautiful walk, so that was pretty cool. The entire day
was devoted to building a small house and thatching it for the corn, so I got
to see how Q’eqchi houses are thatched, and that was awesome. After a long day,
we went back to eat caldo at one of my uncle’s places (Elias and his wife
Cecilia, I’m sure they’ll come up again in here at some point). Went home and
rested, and here we are.
I gotta say, I’m absolutely loving it out here. I love these
people, this village, the fact that I can walk around and literally say hi
(dyoos!) to anyone, or straight up go to someone’s house unannounced and just
hang out for a bit. That last part is actually done all the time and encouraged
in Q’eqchi culture, which is amazing. Here’s the hippie you predicted coming out
Sarah, but I’m totally digging the collectivist culture in Belize. I’m also
reading On the Road by Jack Kerouac right now since one of the last volunteers left
it here, so that’s probs feeding into the lingo there too. I love that
everything is shared here, and that while I have a room and can close the door
if I want to, I don’t want to, because it’s just another part of the house here
that everyone shares. Even now, 3 of my host siblings are looking at photos on
my camera right next to me as I type this, and it’s great. Just being present
really is enough here, and that’s really flipping cool. I have a feeling these next
2 years are absolutely going to fly by, and it’s going to be so hard leave here
when I have to. In the meantime, there’s a lot of work to do, and a bunch of
awesome little kids next to me to hang out with.
Yo’o!
Bryan
P.S. My village definitely does not have internet, and I’ll
likely get access to it every 2 or 3 weeks I think if I’m lucky – so if it
takes awhile to reply, that’s why!
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