Friday, May 23, 2008

work

The school that we are doing our training at went on a 3-4 hour hike yesterday for Arbor Day. It was all uphill and today I am in pain. Yet, it was really fun and it felt great doing exercise. After the event, we, fellow trainees and I, sat down and talked about it. We went down the line and said, “The American in me cringed when…” I said when the kids kept pulling out all the plants and killing so many little bugs on Arbor Day. Also when it was completely muddy down this hill and all the guys in my class were pushing each other down the hill, several of them falling. All okay and smiling, despite the mud now covering their backs. It’s going to be something that we will have to try to work on, both with the kids and with ourselves to try to understand the youth. Upon finishing this walk-a-thon, we went down to relax by the muni (city building, which is surrounded by a school, park, basketball/soccer court, Catholic Church, and a bunch of little stores.) But on our way down I saw what looked like a thrift store out of the corner of my eye, so Carmen and I stopped in…and there were books! O, glorious books! Children’s books like Courdoroy, Dr. Seuss’ ones, Bearnstein Bears, etc. All in English. So we are thinking about translating them into Spanish and using them for either host relatives or the kids we end up working with. Likely both. They are each only a Quetzal; the US dollar is at about 7.5Q so the books are super cheap. In the words of Dr.Fitzsimmons, “read, read, read!”

About 150 students and some teachers are also going to Peten pretty soon on a fieldtrip and 3 out of 4 of us are going on this two day trip with the youth, just to get to know them better and to serve as chaperones. I have about 48 students in my class. About half are supposed to be going. The other day I had to give my first dinamica (ice breaker) and it went alright. It could have gone much better but making mistakes is good, helps me realize I am nowhere near an expert or invincible, and pushes me to work harder. So the dinamica was a combination of two: I had the students take a notecard, put their name in the middle and in each corner write two things about themselves. In one corner, two adjectives to describe themselves; another corner had two favorite books or movies; another corner had two things they like to do in their free time; last one had their two favorite singers or groups. I collected them, and shuffled through quickly to look at the answers. I would name something that the kids had in common and they would have to run to the middle of the circle. I did that a few times. Then I had them take a piece of candy or two and say something interesting or unique about themselves. I thought that this would help me memorize names and faces. Silly me. Factors that made my dinamica a bit difficult: there was no teacher (the students have exams next week so many of the teachers were preparing for that), it was outside (it was really distracting for the students and the wind made it hard for them to hear me and for me to hear them), and length (I have 48 students and each class period is about 35 mins long so there was too much to cover in such a small amount of time). Also I should have considered exactly how much info the students would want to share about themselves the first time. Nevertheless, it was good and I have many more dinamicas and charlas to give that will prepare me to foresee some things like this.

I love you all. Please take care and always stay positive.

Thursday, May 22, 2008

If this doesn't make you smile...


I know I don't look terribly thrilled but you prob wouldn't if your brother was leaving for Afghanistan in a month. However, it was a cool opportunity. PS, sorry, Perla.

Sunday, May 18, 2008

MR´s Bday Bash




Good times. More info later. Love you guys.

Thursday, May 15, 2008

Pictures to prove I still exist





Top picture is my host mom carrying my brother. Supposedly it doesn´t hurt her back or neck. Maybe if I lose a little bit of weight she will carry me in there too :0)

Next is my bedroom. I promised religion and I think I came through.

Last picture is of me and my homie Skeletor. This was in Antigua Guatemala.

IPC

The past few days I’ve been sick with stomach problems. This Monday we had a whole session on diarrhea at the PC training center and I kept convincing myself throughout that every single worm that the nurse was talking about was inside me but I think it’s pretty unlikely. My host mother snuck in some herbal things (garlic, apazote, and something else) into my chamomile tea without me knowing this afternoon and I kind of feel better which is so nice when your day is filled with studying Spanish, adapting to a culture, integrating into a new family, learning about development, etc. Today we went to the middle and high school which is an Instituto por Cooperativa (cooperative because the school is funded three ways; parents, municipality and national government). I am working with 3o Basico which is the third and last year of middle school with children ranging from 13 or 14 to 18. All the kids were really nice and wanted me to sit with them in class. I was with them for a few hours, spanning two P.E. periods, Social Studies and Math. Physical Education was interesting. The kids played basketball, did some wheelbarrow racing and person on another person’s shoulder racing. The last two were very dangerous. They were racing across a concrete court. Some of the kids were banging up their knees and elbows. One girl fell of her partner’s back onto the floor. It was painful to watch. Social Studies was alright. The students were instructed to bring a copy of a map and ¾ of the class didn’t do it. Tsk tsk. Then Math came and the students seemed to like that better. But I think they may have liked it better simply because the teacher postponed their test since I was there making observations. I’ll be working with these kids for the next two months once or twice a week.

On the home front, aside from being sick, everything is good. I made crepes for my family and they liked them. I gave some to two of my host uncles too. One lives next door and is named Rodolfo. He comes over everyday to play with the baby. He sounds like Winnie the Pooh. Same laugh. My other host uncle is Juan and he lives across the street. He has come over twice since I’ve been here and I think he has been the easiest one to talk to in all the family. I get to meet the rest of the family and part of the town this Saturday. It is my little brother’s birthday and about 100 people are invited to break the piñata.

I miss everyone. Love you. Shout out to GB whose birthday is coming up this Monday. Love you, papa!

Pictures of school visits


I need to get a lot better about posting on here considering the internet café is right across the street from my house. I actually do not have the overwhelming desire to get on the internet which is good. What have I been up to? Mainly doing a lot of homework, hanging out with my host family and fellow trainees, and being sick. We have Spanish class every day for a couple hours, sometimes the whole day. Some days we have technical training where we go over specific information for our program, which I haven’t really mentioned anything about. Most know that I am doing Youth Development (YD) but what you probably don’t know is that the program is new. Currently there are 6 Peace Corps Volunteers (PCV) that are kind of creating a framework for the program but the rest of the Peace Corps Trainees (PCT) for YD (us) will be the first full group of PCVs. I think we are all really excited about it. When we first found out what we were going to be doing, I couldn’t stop smiling. Last week had the opportunity to shadow a Small Business Volunteer that works heavily with youth, mainly middle school students. We visited two of the schools that he works in. One was in a town near Ciudad Vieja (which was the capital before the old capital of Antigua Guatemala; current capital is Guatemala City) and was called San Miguel Duenas. This school was more urban but not urban by US standards. There were no skyscrapers in the background. We went to two classrooms there and the PCV led some dinamicas (basically team building activities or icebreakers but in Spanish). Years with Jr/Sr Scholars has made me love these. The youth also presented before the class some posters on which they illustrated their imaginary businesses. They were typical businesses for their community: bakery, hair salon, convenience store, autoshop, etc. One little girl brought her A-game, stealing a shoe from her classmate to use as a visual aid. She reminded me of Erica S. The kids were kind of nervous about having to present to the gringos but I think most of the PCTs were a lot more nervous. After one class, the teacher thanked us for coming and thanked the PCV for all the work he had done with the kids in his two years there. He then went on to tell the kids that the small business skills that they had learned would really help them because even though most would drop out next year, all they learned could be applied towards many things. They may even be fortunate enough to open up a business later on. So these kids are middle school students. Most of the youth drop out around 6th grade, which in Guatemala is a 12 or 13 years old. Just to give you a view of the youth’s situation here:

  • Pregnancy (average age is 17)
  • Marriage (average age is 18)
  • No like skills education
  • Lack of motivation of parents and teachers; lack of communication among both
  • Drop outs
  • Agrarian culture (50% rural, 50% Mayan; many don’t study because they work in the fields)
  • Poverty (many living on less than $1 a day)
  • Lack of opportunity in their communities (so some migrate)
  • Lack of preparation for work (will work in the informal economy in the city selling candy, umbrellas, bootleg CDs)
  • HIV (more so near the Caribbean)
  • Sexuality (taboo subject)
  • Gangs
  • No life plans (some have parents in the U.S. who send back money so they won’t work if they are receiving money)
  • Systemic racism and discrimination (towards indigenous population and women)
  • Lack of self-esteem (often passed down from parents)
  • Parents with lack of education

Needless to say the teacher’s speech made me sad because these kids were so young and they basically had absolutely no choice but to drop out and work to support the family. Other things you should know are: the illiteracy rate for women is about 64% while for men is 42%. Men attend school for an average of 4.4 years while women spend 3.5 years. Eighty percent of the indigenous population is illiterate and 1 in 2 ladinos (Spanish and indigenous mix) is illiterate. About 43% of the population drops out in elementary school. Lastly, the government of Guatemala spends 1.8% of the total budget on education, compared to 3.1% in El Salvador, 4% in Honduras, 5% in Nicaragua and 7% in Costa Rica.

Wednesday, May 7, 2008

New address

For those who you like to send me letters, postcards, pictures or sunflower seeds (low sodium, please) here is my new address (but not where I am living):

my full name, PCT
Cuerpo de Paz-Peace Corps
Apartado Postal 66
Antigua Guatemala, Sacatepequez, 03001
Guatemala, Centro America

I would very much like to hear from everyone. I am doing well, very excited about what is to come but worried about the mouse that was eating the potato salad Monday night. Mother´s Day is coming up. Love you, mama. Pictures will soon follow, I promise. All my love.

Sunday, May 4, 2008

First week

I’ll try to make this quick because honestly, there too many things to write about. I’ve been in Guatemala less than a week but I’ve experienced so much already. I just got back from misa (mass). Church in general is a distant memory and I kind of feel guilty going since my mom has begged me over the years to go with her but I am somewhat forced to know more about the culture and religion is a big part of life here. During lunch yesterday, my host father, Don Rodrigo, plainly asked, “What religion are you?” My host sister later asked me the same thing. And my bedroom has about ten pictures of Jesus Christ, as well as about 5 calendars. We were told to just say that we believe in God even if that notion of God is really abstract. I told him that I hadn’t been to church in ages but that I believed in God. My family is Catholic but right next door is an Evangelical church whose members meet every 4 hours, possibly every day. It’s nice because I know all the songs but they started to worship again at 10pm and I was already in bed. I guess I will have to get used to it since I will be living next door to this place for 3 months. On the bright side, the Catholic Church has livelier music than other masses I’ve been too.

Let me rewind though and give a run down of my host family. My host mom is Dona Eva who is in her early 50s. She is nice and bought me ice cream yesterday so she already partially won me over. She can be a little serious at times and sometimes looks sad and like she has a lot on her mind. She does many things: sells Avon; makes tablecloths and aprons to sell in order to gain funds to buy viveres (essentials like flour or toilet paper) for people who are very ill in the community; provides contraceptives and shots to prevent pregnancies. But she does not do abortions. She used to be a nurse back when there were no doctors or pharmacies in town. She also used to be a community planner, encouraging people to stay in their towns and build the local economy but according to her, she was no longer able to do that once the conflict started because people fled from their towns and it was too dangerous to stay around. My host father is Don Rodrigo. He is funny and very protective over his family. He is in love with his grandson, Mario Rodrigo, the baby of the family. Mario Rodrigo reminds me of the baby on the show Dinosaurs. “I’m the baby, gotta love me.” He throws things a lot and grunts. Pretty hilarious. I’m not sure what my host father does but I know they have terreno (piece of land where they plant crops). My host sister is named Flor. She is lives at home with her parents and is the only child. They had another child but died after 8 months because of leukemia. She is very mindful of her parents’ opinions. Then her husband is Mario. Also nice and hard working. He is going to school in Guatemala City, works in catering and in a factory. I have a large extended family but I haven´t met everyone yet. I miss the family that I was with for the first three days, the Castellanos. They were more outgoing but I´m sure I will get used to this family. I miss my real family especially. I miss hanging out with Bear and Rab. I miss my mama´s smell and GarBear leaving newspapers in my bathroom. And I miss Phillip not answering my phone calls. I love you guys. Hello to all friends (especially Roy, Apryll and Chris) and any Jr-Sr Scholars who may be reading this.