More About Work

*I decided to edit and re-upload this particular blog post for several reasons. While the original post did reflect my feelings and position at the time, I realize that it could be easily misunderstood. This blog is not meant to represent the opinions of the Peace Corps or the US (as my disclaimer states). However, I know I must continue to remain mindful of what I choose to discuss, as my blog will be some people’s only idea of Colombia*

So ten months have officially passed as of June 27^th, yet I still haven’t actually explained what I’m doing at site. So here’s the deal. About seven months ago I moved to my pueblo (that I can’t mention by name for security reasons) with the intent of being a “co-teacher/English teacher trainer”. Having had no experience teaching English, much less training someone else how to teach English, I was apprehensive at best. I moved to my site around November 18^th which is basically the end of the year. The Colombian school system more or less follows the calendar year. As a result November was the worst time to move in. Like most people (I’m sure around the world) no one is too keen on learning/teaching with the end of the year so close. The following two weeks I got to observe a few classes, and learn about the culture of the school. This mainly consisted of me sitting awkwardly in the back of the classroom, and enduring seemingly endless introductions.

My school is huge—at least by Watkinson standards where my graduating class had 56 people in it (and was the biggest class in the history of the school). There are a little over a thousand kids in the secondary school. Each class has about forty to forty-five students in it, and each grade has about five classes. The classrooms are probably built to fit about thirty students, which usually means that students are almost sitting on top of each other. Being in a poorer area (as almost all PCVs are), my school lacks many resources that are taken for granted in the states. This means: broken roof, cracked floors, desks that are falling apart, complete lack of classroom materials, and absolutely no technology available. To put this all in perspective, the only thing provided for teachers is a whiteboard. Also we didn’t receive our government issued textbooks until a few weeks ago. Yes that’s right. For five months out of ten month school year we had no books. Unfortunately this appears to be the norm throughout PC Colombia posts. It appears as if there is some disconnect between the Ministry of Education, and the schools in each department (think state). For example, during training I met the ministry of education for Bolivar which is the department that I work in. She was a very pleasant and informative woman who answered all of our questions about what to expect in the classroom. She was in charge of making sure that all schools received there materials on time. However, she informed us that she was recently engaged and moving to Bogotá. This meant that once she was gone, there was a major shift in the office, which resulted in a delay on receiving our books.

 Luckily my English teachers are pretty organized, and have a basic outline of what students should learn each year. While this plan is really just a skeleton of a syllabus, it has helped to give the last five months some structure. I’m really blessed because there are other Colombia PCVs in schools with no syllabus, and English teachers who don’t actually speak English. So for the past five months I’ve been working mostly on basic vocabulary with my sixth and seventh graders. We haven’t really touched grammar, which worries me, but it could be worse. 

The Classroom

There are many things that I could say about working in my classes. But I want to try and stay as objective as possible. It is really easy to get caught up in complaining about what’s wrong with your school. As I mentioned previously, most of my classrooms have upwards of forty students. Now imagine me, working with forty pre-teens who think that they are literally too cool for school (lol I couldn’t help it). The age of my students range drastically, and many aren’t the typical age for their grade. For example, I teach eleven year olds and fifteen year olds in my sixth grade class. My seventh grade class has fourteen year olds, and kids who are only a few years younger than me. This creates a very interesting dynamic in the classroom.

It is incredibly hard to get my students to actively participate in the classroom. I’m sure a lot of this comes from embarrassment. Why would you want to speak a language that you barley understand with a teacher who’s a native speaker? Of course there are the kids who are quick to shout out the answer, whether it’s wrong or right. Although they can be very annoying, I’m glad to have them when no one else wants to talk—especially the kids in the back. To actually get to the back of the classroom I have to fight through the obstacle of desks jammed together because of lack of space. When I project my voice (because yelling and projecting are two completely different things) and call out to them specifically, I’m usually met with silence. Other times it’s a nonchalant shrug followed with “no hablo ingles”. My counterparts typically don’t make kids answer; this is to avoid “pena” (embarrassment/shame) in front of the other students. This means that there are kids that literally say and do nothing for two hours in class without repercussions. When you ask some kids why they aren’t taking notes, or doing an activity, they’ll answer “I forgot my pen/pencil/notebook/book bag”. This is one thing that really pisses me off. It would be one thing if I knew my kids couldn’t afford these basic school supplies. But this is not the case. Some days they just don’t want to do work, so to avoid it, they don’t bring anything with them. Once again no repercussions.

Then there are the fights. I’ve learned that this is not typical in other volunteers’ sites, so I don’t want to generalize. But my kids are literally always fighting. It might be a “city” thing as my site is more urban than country—but that’s no excuse. It’s always over the dumbest stuff too.The fights will break out quickly with students grabbing pencils and pens to stab each other. This of course sets off their classmates who egg them on and shout “pelea!” (fight!). Now technically as a volunteer I am not supposed to involve myself in fights. But when kids are literally about to kill each other, I have to jump in. I understand that these school fights are a result of other things going on in my pueblo. To even think about having a fight as a solution, means that my students are seeing other people fight. This is not too different from schools back home where students fight for the same reason. The crazy thing is that, by the next day, the kids are fine. The same two kids that wanted to kill each other the day before, will be best friends the next day. I’m still trying to figure that one out.

The grading system is interesting. Students’ assignments are graded on a scale from one to ten, with ten being the equivalent of 100. There aren’t any rubrics, so most grading is typically done arbitrarily. This leads to major issues with grade inflation. I personally wouldn’t bring the typical math based grading approach to the classroom (ex. If there are ten questions, each is worth one point, you need seven right to pass). If I did literally everyone would fail. The students do their work in a notebook which the teacher grades (and sometimes they ask me to help out). They usually scan the notebook for a little while then give the student a grade. Now remember, most of my English teachers are intermediate English speakers (at best) so there are a lot of mistakes they don’t see. When I try to point it out, they kind of brush me off and say it’s not important. Now part of my wants to scream when this happens. How can we expect students to truly learn if they are not corrected? It appears as if some of my counterparts think the students will be discouraged if they receive bad grades. I’m sure that this is true, but I think that they help students realize what they need to work on.  I’m sure another part of it is that teachers don’t want kids to be held back. I’m not exactly sure how this system works. But at the end of the year, all of the kids who are on the verge of failing have to do “recuperacion”. This typically means giving failing kids a review packet from the past semester to complete. Once completed sufficiently the kids are given a passing grade. I’m not sure what happens to kids that don’t fill out the packet, but supposedly only a few kids are held back each year. This system is obviously very different than the one that I’m used to. It can be very frustrating to see kids fool around for the whole semester, receive a failing grade, only to be given a pass after completing a packet. Especially when there are kids who come to class prepared every day, complete every assignment, and behave respectfully.

Now I don’t want this to sound like a negative post. I just want to be as honest as I can about what’s going on at my site. There are clearly many issues with the Colombian educational system (as there are in most countries); if there weren’t problems Peace Corps wouldn’t need to be here. But despite how crazy my kids send me, I enjoy working with them. It also makes me exponentially more grateful for all the teachers that I’ve had. Teachers are incredible people, and I honestly think that they don’t get as much credit as they deserve.

Future Plans  

Once this break is over I’m switching some of my classes. With one of the two World Teach volunteers gone, I can now work with the ninth graders (much more mature and calm). This gives me more freedom to do what I want to do. I’m also working on the World Map Project, which is pretty popular throughout Peace Corps. I’ve been given two walls on my school grounds—one for a mural and one for a map. I plan to work with students to paint a World Map with a focus on languages (ex. English speaking countries in red, Spanish in purple, Chinese in green, etc). I also would really love to work with girl’s empowerment or sex ed with my students. Basically I want to do more than just teaching in the classroom. 

On another note I am mere weeks away from my one year mark. Time really flies! Colombia has become my home over the past 11 months, and I can’t imagine how difficult it will be to leave. Whenever I’m in Cartagena (which is super touristy) and people pick up on my American accent, they ask: "how long are you here for?" It gives me so much pleasure to say “I live here”, which never fails to surprise them. There are hard days of course, where I really just want to hop on the next plane back home. Service here can be tough because there are really no tangible ways of seeing your progress. You never really know if teaching English to your students is getting through to them. Will they even remember you once you leave? I really hope so.

What I've Been Up To

* Written on June 26th 2015*

Ankle Update

Well exactly two months have passed since I last wrote a blog. I am happy to report that my ankle is getting better poco a poco (little by little). My ankle is still a bit weak, and gets stiff in the mornings, but it’s doing much better. About two weeks after the paro ended I had a training to go to in Puerto Colombia (which is about two and a half hours away from my site). My ankle was still pretty bad at that point. I had an obvious limp, and had trouble walking down stairs without experiencing intense pain. The PCMO (Peace Corps Medical Officer) was going to be at the training that Friday, and I was trying to consider whether or not I should talk to her about my ankle. Part of me just thought that it would get better on its own. I also wanted to avoid having any serious medical interventions that might end up in “medical separation” aka having to go home for good early. I mentioned this to the PC director who seemed a bit appalled that I had yet to talk to the PCMO. She said something along the lines of “you have excellent health care at your disposal here, take advantage of it”—so I did. After a frustratingly round about Orthopedic appointment (that involved x-rays without protection vests *shudder*) I was given five day physical therapy prescription. This meant that, instead of going home, I was put up in the PC hotel (where PCVs stay when they have medical issues) for an extra week. Every day I had a physical therapy appointment with a very nice physical therapist. I was still in a significant amount of pain after five days, so I was given five more appointments. By this time I was going slightly insane. I had all of the creature comforts that I had grown accustomed to (wifi! Air conditioning! My own space! American fast food!). But I couldn’t do much more than be lazy in my room all day waiting for my next physical therapy appointment. After ten days (which was about 15 days away from site) I still didn’t see much improvement. The worrier in me thought that I would need surgery, which would inevitably lead to a foot amputation. But after spending literally four minutes in the doctor’s office, I was told that it would work itself out in a month. If it didn’t, I would have to come back for an injection (shudder). Thankfully it looks like that follow up appointment won’t be necessary.

Tech IST

As I mentioned before I recently had a training with one of my counterparts. This training was focused on brainstorming plans (between PCVs and counterparts) to bring back to site, and make improvements. It wasn’t necessarily focused on English as we were encouraged to discuss other problems we thought existed in the school/community. PCVs were informed that we had to choose a counterpart, and secure permission from the Rector/a (principal) for the teacher to be absent for a few days. Now I naively thought that this would be easy to do. What a silly thought. First I had to pick a counterpart to bring with me. There are four English teachers in my school, and I work with two of them. One of the counterpart’s is more motivated to work with me than the other (and that is putting it very lightly). My other counterpart views me as what PCVs refer to as, a “pronunciation parrot”. All she really wants me to do is pronounce words that she doesn’t know in English, than sit back down. Now at first I tried to fight this, and be more active in the classroom. Then I just realized that it wasn’t working. In addition she has no control over the behavior of the students, who typically are wild I the classroom. I came to terms with the fact that I would not overexert myself for someone who didn’t take me seriously (more on this in another blog post).

Basically I had to find a culturally sensitive way to invite one counterpart, knowing that the other one would inevitably find out. I’ve had people who know me well call me “blunt” and “insensitive” (which I think is just a misinterpretation of my straightforwardness lol), so you can imagine how difficult this was for me (not to mention while only speaking Spanish). I told my “better” counterpart Viraida that I “worked with her more” (which is a lie), so that it made more sense to bring her. She was elated and ready to go, but unsure of whether she would get permission. Typically our Rectora sends Catalina, who is the head of the English Department, to all PC events. She encouraged me to speak with the Rectora—I assumed this had to with her not wanting to “make waves”. As a foreigner it was probably easier for me to circumvent the bureaucracy that exists in my school. Seeing as my Rectora is literally never in the school, I was unsure how I would get a hold of her. I ended up emailing her (in formal Spanish!) explaining the situation as best as I could, while explicitly stating which counterpart I preferred to bring.

When I did not receive a reply from her, I emailed the PC office to see if they had received anything. I was told that the Rectora had chosen Catalina to come with me. Frustrated, I went back to Viraida and explained the situation to her. She was visibly disappointment, and ready to go with the flow and skip the training. I wasn’t about to let that happen. I sent another, more strongly worded, email to the Rectora. I also tracked her down in her office, and further explained why I wanted to bring Viraida. She finally relented and gave her permission, allowing her to take advantage of the training opportunity.

This is one of those things that I view as a mini-victory.

Community Class

In other news I have started to volunteer at a community English class. Rudulfo, a philosophy teacher at my school, is an avid English student. He speaks to me and the other volunteers all the time in English, and constantly thanks us for volunteering in his country. He’s a pretty nice guy and is only slightly creepy in the way I’ve found most, older Colombian men to be. He mentioned a few times that he works at night teaching English to adults in the community. I personally find this interesting as he is a Basic English speaker but I still find it admirable—and as my mother would say “one eyed man is King in blind man’s country”. After a few months hearing about this class I decided to show up. The school is very close to the plaza, and I’m surprised that I never noticed it before. It’s a really cute school and much smaller than my own school. I enjoyed meeting the students, and explaining why I was there. It was definitely nicer to interact with people closer to my age. Like always I was asked if I had a husband, boyfriend, or kids. I got the customary shocked look when I answered “no” to all three, while adding that I was completely happy (soltera y feliz!! Sin hijos y feliz!!). This is where the conversation got interesting. Rudulfo brought up that my marital/childless status was due to cultural differences (which isn’t necessarily true as there are married Americans my age with kids). He noted that this was a good cultural difference because there were too many young adults in the pueblo with several kids, and little education. That’s when the younger students all mentioned that they had children of their own. The 23 year old male students had two kids, and a girlfriend. A nineteen year old female student had one child, and all the older students had several kids. Now at this point I had to keep a straight face, because you know, cultural sensitivity is an important thing. I tried to explain that children drastically change the trajectory of your life, and I couldn’t handle that at this stage (which is the politically correct way of saying “kids ruin your life”). Then the 23 year old, which the straightest face, asked me “but children are blessing are they not”? To which I answered “yes they are, but they’re not the type of blessings I need right now”. Got to love cultural integration.

I’m currently on “summer” vacation until mid-July. I’ve started up a project at my school where a mural of the world map is painted on a wall. This map in particular will be color coordinated by most common language spoken. I hope that this allows students to learn a little bit about the world around them. Unfortunately not many of them know about life outside the pueblo. The map directions were a bit daunting, and I managed to screw up the pencil grid that would be later used to trace each country. I was working alongside eleventh graders that Catalina recruited. I successfully fought down the perfectionist delegator ( Word is telling me that this is not a word, but "one who delegates" is just so much more clunky) in me that was not happy about how lax they were being. This was compounded by the fact that I couldn’t delegate effectively in Spanish, which I’m sure diminished my authority in their eyes.

But anyway I’m taking this time to relax, and plan to visit some other volunteers. Can’t believe that I’m creeping toward the one year mark!

Brief Update

Note this was written on April 26th and posted on May 4th. As of now the paro continues.

I admit that I gave been very bad about keeping up with this blog. Before arriving in Colombia I promised myself to try and update my blog as much as I could. I want it to be like a window into my life as a volunteer, and life in Colombia in general. In more recent news, there is currently a nationwide teachers paro (strike) going on. Since last week there were rumors that the teachers union was organizing a strike. From what I understand, many believe that their positions as teachers are not respected enough by the government. There is dissatisfaction with the salaries received by teachers, as well as the level of support they receive in the classroom. Remember how I said that it was a nationwide strike? Well for some reason the teachers in my school decided not to strike. Actually, all but five teachers decided not to strike, which I was told was due to a “difference in ideologies”. In theory this would mean that at my school it would be business as usual. Of course not. Since many families heard there was a strike going on, they didn't send their children to school. This means that, while almost all the teachers arrived on Wednesday, only about a fourth of the students showed up. When students did show up, but their teacher was on strike, they used it as an opportunity to run wild. On Thursday, even fewer students showed up and the teachers had a meeting about whether or not to join the strike. They chose not to, and went along with class like normal. When I say “class” I mean sitting in a room with four out of forty students trying to pretend that you don’t want to leave as much as they do.

On Thursday I took advantage of the lax schedule and decided to play volleyball with some of my sixth graders. Anyone who knows me knows how competitive I am. It doesn't matter what kind of game it is, once it’s a competition, I play to win. I've found this particular aspect of my personality to be quite hard to control. That means that, even when playing a calm game with students (who have little experience with volleyball), I want to win. My natural volleyball instincts from being on my high school team came out. So when the ball was tossed just out of my reach, I didn't let it fall like a normal person. It’s like I could hear my high school coach’s voice in my head screaming “SPRAWL!!” So that’s what I did. As I went to bend down and reach for the ball, my ankle twisted and I fell to the ground. It felt like I was falling in slow motion, as I heard and felt the tendons in my foot shake. Then I felt the pain shoot up my leg as I tried to keep a straight face and refrain from yelling obscenities. The gym teacher got me ice and looked at my foot worriedly as I tried to play it off like I wasn't in pain. After hobbling home early and taking a look at the damage I was ashamed. My competitiveness really backfired this time. The whole top of my foot and ankle was swollen, and I could barely move it. It hurt to walk because every time my foot flexed there was pain. Luckily there was an ace bandage in my PC medical kit. So using my fading first aid knowledge, I wrapped my foot tightly and hoped for the best.

When the rest of my host family came home everyone was very concerned for me. Being the independent person that I am, I refused to rest and attempted to walk on my foot like nothing had happened. That night my host mom insisted on rubbing my foot with Colombian icyhot as she lovingly told me that, if I didn't ask for help, I would offend her. As luck would have it, my school decided to join the strike so I didn't have class Friday. I chilled at home for the weekend trying not to move, and being inventive when I had to. As of now I've used a broomstick as a cane, a chair as a walker, and just opted to hop around the house. My foot has been getting better slowly, but its Sunday and I still can’t walk normally. Just today I heard that the paro is indefinido so no more classes for the week. Not sure yet if that’s a good or bad thing.

Until next time. 

6 Months Down 21 To Go

I have made it to the six month mark. It’s crazy to think that I have been living in Colombia for 6 months. This is officially the longest I have ever lived outside of the country. Like I’ve said before, time here is so funny. Some days I feel like I have been here for my whole life. Other days it seems like I was boarding the plane to Barranquilla just yesterday. Six months (and some change) ago I was sipping daiquiris on Miami Beach wondering what the next two years would be like. I was fresh out of college and still very unsure of what the future had in store for me. I said goodbye to my friends, family, and everything that I know with the hope that it would all be worth it. I’ve changed a lot since that night in August. Some changes are obvious while others are much harder to verbalize. To celebrate my six month PC mark, I have decided to highlight 6 ways that I have changed/grown.

Spanish Level

One of the more selfish reasons for my desire to serve in South America, was to gain Spanish fluency. To be bilingual in the US is an extremely valuable skill, especially if you have Spanish as a second language. I hoped that by living in Colombia for two years, I would be able to acquire that Spanish level. After living here for six months I think that I have to lower my expectations. I do not think I will be able to become fluent in Spanish, but I am sure I can gain proficiency. In my PC group there are several people who have studied ESL/EFL or studied language in some other form. They’ve explained the difference between fluency and proficiency several times, but I’m still not sure I quite understand it. I think they explained it like:

Fluency: To be able to speak a second language with equal fluidity as you do your primary language.

Proficiency: To be able to speak a second language very well. You are able to have day-to-day conversations in the second language. You are able to speak in a second language at a pace that is considered normal for conversations. However you are not as strong in the second language as you are your first.

If you studied languages and I got these definitions wrong please forgive me! I was a sociology and anthropology major in college, so I don’t have too much experience in that field. Anyway after realizing this difference I determined that I would more likely gain Spanish proficiency. I remember arriving in Barranquilla and freaking out when I had to take my initial Language Proficiency Interview (LPI). It was the interview that would determine what level of Spanish we had, and therefore how much we had to learn. For some reason I was overly confident in my Spanish skills (although I hadn’t actually used my Spanish in regular conversation since my tenth grade service trip to Oaxaca, Mexico). Then I took the LPI and realized how much I’d really forgotten. The LPI is set up like this:

-          The interviewer begins with basic Spanish questions to see how you respond

-          Judging from your response the interviewer can determine if to ask harder or easier questions

-          During the discussion, the interviewer is looking to see how complex the interviewee’s grammar and vocabulary is

-          When the interviewer believes that the interviewee has reached their Spanish capacity, the interview is ended

I don’t remember exactly what was discussed in my initial LPI. I do remember being asked to describe my room. I remembered that cama meant bed, but couldn’t describe much more than that. I said something like “uh, I have a bed. My walls are blue. I have a TV”…that’s it (lol). I probably only understood 30% of what people told me, and I was completely overwhelmed all of the time. Thanks to four hour daily Spanish classes my skills steadily increased. As of now I think I’m gaining proficiency, but have not reached it yet. I understand about 90% of what people say to me, and am usually able to respond quickly enough to keep up a conversation.

Weird Spanglish-isms

That brings me to point two. Having two languages in my head can get kind of weird. Sometimes I’ll catch myself using Spanish words as I’m thinking to myself. It’ll be something like “It’s Saturday so no hay agua (there is no water) entonces (so) I’ll have to do laundry on Sunday”. It’s really weird because I’m not trying to think in Spanish it just happens. Same with conversations. If I’m conversing with a native Spanish speaker in English, I’ll find myself slipping into Spanish. Usually the person is speaking to me only in English because they want to practice. However I always find myself reverting to Spanish then slipping back into English. It’s completely involuntary and I find it kind of cool actually. I’ve even had a few dreams where, only after waking up, do I realize were in half Spanish and half English. Other times I’ll be watching a show (side note: my family has DirectTV which allows you to change channels from Spanish to English) only to realize several minutes later that it’s in Spanish. It’s like my brain doesn’t register the language difference for a while. Sometimes (like now) I’ll be writing in English and find myself typing certain words phonetically/using words that sound like that word instead. For example if I mean to write: “I’ve been living here in Colombia for six months”. I’ll write: “I’ve been living hear in Colombia for six months”. It’s strange and sometimes I don’t catch the mistake for a while. I have no idea if/how that’s related to learning a new language (and just right then I almost typed realated instead of related). Basically I’m finding it much easier to slip from one language to another which I guess is a sign of language acquisition.

What I Eat

My diet has changed dramatically. Contrary to popular belief, Colombian Costeño food is NOT like chipotle/every other “Mexican” restaurant you’ve been to. Like most other PCVs around the world, I spend most of my free time daydreaming about food I could be eating at home. I’ve traveled a lot, but it’s only after being here for six months that I realized something big. There are many places in the world with food cultures that are less diverse than in the US. At home you can have food from a different culture every day of the week. I can eat Thai pad Thai on Sunday, Korean BBQ on Monday, Jamaican jerk chicken on Tuesday, and so on. Access to such a diverse supply of food was something that I took for granted. Here on the coast people eat variations of the same food every day. Some things are different. Sunday you may have fried fish with arroz de coco (which is amazing btw), and Wednesday you may have baked chicken with white rice. But it’s all basically the same thing. I really miss being able to eat completely different foods whenever I feel like it. I don’t mind eating costeño food but sometimes I just really want something new. Like my study abroad semester in Rwanda, I have less access to processed foods. As a result I can’t eat half as badly as here as I did in the US, even if I wanted to. Now my junk food binges consist of eating a jar of peanut butter in a week (and paying and arm and a leg for it at the supermarket) or drinking two 600 mL (which is small) in a day. I’m living on the edge, I know lol. To my benefit this change in diet, along with an increase in veggie/fruit/water consumption, has caused me to lose around 30 lbs.

Tolerance of Small Children

Anyone who knows me knows that I’m not really a “kid person”. There are some people in this world that are blessed with the personality to tolerate kids for long periods of time. I have never been one of those people. I like my space, I don’t like people touching me, and I am far from a patient person. These are qualities that do not equate to being a kid person. However after working in my school for 3 months my students have started to grow on me. I work with sixth and seventh graders who are probably the rowdiest kids in the school. But I honestly enjoy working with them, and look forward to getting to know them all better. I get really excited when I’m walking around the school or my community and a kid shouts “Amanda!”(or whatever random English phrase they’ve memorized) while waving energetically. I still wouldn’t call myself a kid person but I’m definitely getting there.

Admitting That I Don’t Know Something

I’m one of those people who hate admitting that they don’t know something. This, coupled with my extreme confidence in things I do know, has caused people to call me arrogant (which I think is absolutely hilarious. Would I be called arrogant if I were a man? Or just confident?). It is almost impossible for me to be like that here. With constant language miscommunications I’ve had to admit when I don’t know what’s going on. When I first got here I would nod my head a lot and say “si” (yes), even when I didn’t understand, with the hope that everything would turn out ok. This was usually coupled with the blank stare that is a dead giveaway that someone has no idea what you just said. Now I admit when I don’t understand (no entiendo) or don’t know (no se). It has helped me learn because people are always willing to rephrase what they said in another way.

Overall Tolerance of People

                Anyone who knows me knows that I do not like to be touched. I have never been a touchy person, and usually feel uncomfortable around people who are. I am a reserved, introverted, only child. This basically means that I really like my own space, I don’t mind being alone for long periods of time (I actually quite enjoy it), and I am extremely comfortable with silence. All of these very ingrained aspects of my personality have been tested while living here on the coast. I was fully aware before arriving in Barranquilla that costeño culture was not what I was used to. Costeños are said to be loud, touchy, and family oriented. When you walk into a room it is customary to do the hug/cheek kiss greeting—even with strangers. As someone who does not like to be touched it took a while to get over people invading my personal space. But now it’s second nature—almost (lol). In addition many families here on the coast live together forever. For example, I live with my host mom, her teenage son, her adult daughter and husband, and their two kids. Usually parents build on to their homes to help their extended family fit in. So, I live in the right section of my house with my host mom and brother, while everyone else lives on the left side.

                The thought of living with my family forever and ever makes me shudder. However living here has made me used to constantly being around people—and not just family either. The structure of the house makes it easy for people to come walking through the back, or through the front door (I promise the home is very secure though). Thankfully my lack of Spanish means that I’m not expected to do much more than say hello and maybe give a cheek kiss. My family is also really good about maintaining my privacy. If I am in my room with the door closed no one comes knocking, or opening my door to talk to me. However I think they assume I’m always sleeping if I’m in my room, which is kind of funny. Sometimes I just want time to myself to read or relax. Whenever I come out they exclaim “oh I thought you were sleeping!” Basically I’m more of a people person here in Colombia. Shocking right?

                I have now completed exactly one fourth of my service, and have 21 more months to go (not that I’m counting or anything lol). I look forward to what the rest of my service has in store for me, and am hoping for the best. 

New Year New Me (Or Some Other Cliché Blog Title)

It’s crazy looking back on my last blog post. It literally felt like the sadness would never end, but I’m elated that it has passed. It took me a while to get acclimated to my new life. It was as if a part of me had never really quite made it to Colombia. That piece of me was still trying to live a life in the States that no longer exists. While I am glad that those feelings have passed, I still appreciate how I felt at that moment. It remains an important part of my service so far, and has helped me mature emotionally. As a person who rarely displays emotional distress, it was frightening to experience something so overwhelming. I felt like there was nothing that I could do, and that it would never get better. But it did.

 I’m almost at the six month mark of my service which is wild. I know people say time flies, but it really does! It feels like just yesterday that I was spending my last night on US soil, writing my first PC diary entry in my bed at the Miami Crowne Plaza. I remember having our first meal as PCTs together; the Cuban food was delicious and I would lowkey do anything to eat it again. The night before heading to Barranquilla some of us went out for drinks at Wet Willies and dipped our feet in Miami Beach. At that moment I was anxious and excited to start a new chapter in my life. I never thought that I would experience so much in the first five months.

                Now I’m in my bed at site. I can hear the church on my “street” (I don’t know if to call it a street in the sense that people from back home would envision it. It’s more like a wide path) blasting music from their speakers. I can hear the excited shrieks of my one year old host niece who’s roaming the halls of the house. I can hear the whirring of the washing machine as my host sister goes through piles of laundry. My fan is on high, not because it’s hot, but because I’ve grown so used to the white noise that I can’t concentrate without it. My ears are tuned in to any small noise that comes from within my room. I’ve learned that it is never wise to ignore those sounds.

 I’ve been visited by a very persistent mouse a few times now—I have no idea how it manages to continue invading my space. First I found it living in my night table, so I moved it out of my room. Then it scurried into a sizeable hole in my wall, so I covered it with hot pink duct tape. My host brother in law figured out that it was probably shimmying through the sizeable space between my bedroom door and the floor. That space has since been closed by a strip of drywall nailed to the bottom of my door. When I heard frantic scurrying across my ceiling I assumed that it was another mouse. I was wrong. When I told my host sister about the noise she calmly stated “it’s probably a roach”. Here’s how the conversation went:

*I hear the noise in my ceiling, and open my door frantically looking for help*

Me: Yeliva there’s a mouse in my ceiling

Yeliva: Oh it’s probably a roach

Me: *thinking* There is no way that can be a roach it sounds too big

Yeliva: calls over her husband to check it out

Julio: proceeds to climb on a chair and look at the open space between the house’s ceiling and my ceiling. “Yeah it’s a roach”

Me: shivers in disgust

Yeliva: chuckles, listening as the roach scurries across my ceiling, and directing her husband where to spray the bug spray

Me: pretends that I’m not scared out of my mind. What would’ve happened if that beast made it into my room?

This is my new normal. Sweating 24/7 while everyone remains dry, buying obscene amounts of caramel popcorn from the tienda around the corner, smiling and greeting every single person that I pass on the street (which is major for me and my “resting bitch face”), sitting in two hour classes (while sweating) as kids try their hardest to be the loudest person in the room, and Zumba-ing with my host sister at night…..this is what my life is like now. Honestly, I wouldn’t change anything. I can already see how hard it will be to leave this place next year (it’s crazy that I can actually say next year I will be heading back home, even if it’s in November). I’m going to try and enjoy every little moment because once I leave, I don’t know when I’ll be back.

On another note, I’ve realized that a lot of major dates have passed since I last wrote. Here’s a rundown of some big events that have passed.

Swear In

I never got around to talking about this momentous occasion. For three months I was in the in-between stage between a lowly trainee and a full-fledged volunteer. In order to become a volunteer one must prove that they have the skills and training necessary to be a productive volunteer. Other than actually making it through training (which in itself is an amazing feat), we had several written and oral exams. One of the more anxiety ridden tests for me was my Language Proficiency Interview (LPI). All Peace Corps post have a level of proficiency that PCT’s must achieve in order to become a PCV. For Colombia, all trainees had to be at an intermediate mid-level of Spanish. To put that into perspective, I tested into a Basic mid-level of Spanish a few days after arrival in Colombia. As a result I had three months to jump a full level, which is not as easy as it seems. I have always been an anxious person pre-test time. The pressure on me to succeed on this test had me in a panic. In retrospect I wouldn’t have been kicked out if I didn’t pass. There were PCVs who didn’t achieve intermediate-mid. They were given a tutor who provided one-on-one sessions, as well as a new deadline to achieve the set language level. I ended up passing so I didn’t have to worry about that extra stress. The ceremony itself was nice. It was held at Universidad del Norte which was very close to our training center. It felt really important because the US ambassador to Colombia was present. We also had to take an official oath in Spanish and English, as well as sing the Colombian and US anthem. It was an enjoyable event, and I even got a pin and wristband out of it!

Thanksgiving

This year was my fourth thanksgiving away from home. It lined up with our All Volunteers Conference (AVC) where everyone currently serving meets up for a few days of sessions. Thanksgiving fell on the second day that we were there. It was really nice to be there around my new friends, even though only two weeks had passed since we last saw each other. It was definitely weird to be in the warmth during that time of year. Granted I spent Thanksgiving of 2012 in Rwanda, but it was still kind of weird. As much as I claim to hate New England, I have accepted that I actually enjoy the change in seasons. Thanksgiving dinner was definitely different, and lacked the typical comfort foods that a lot of us are used to. Looking back I am really glad that I had the opportunity to go to AVC. It was the last time that our whole group was together. Since then we have lost six volunteers for various reasons (making it seven gone in total). It’s crazy because during training we all thought that we would all make it to our COS (close of service). I heard somewhere that statistically speaking, most PC training groups lose a third of their trainees by the time swear in rolls around. Every time we had a session with a volunteer from Cll-5, they would look at as surprisingly and say “so all of you are still here?” I would always think “of course we’re all here, why shouldn’t we be!?” Now I have more faith in statistics.

Christmas

Christmas was much less stressful than I thought it would be. Christmas season came right after I got over my emotional dip. I was excited to spend the time with my family, and see how celebrations differed in Colombia. It was definitely different than being in Connecticut. For one, it was ninety degrees! In my whole life I’ve known nothing but cold and snowy Christmases, so this time was definitely weird for me. What made it even crazier was that people throughout Cartagena put up winter themed Christmas decorations. Imagine how strange it was for me to be looking at Santa on a snow capped chimney, as I ate melting ice cream in the sweltering heat! Now I could go into a sociological explanation of the “westernization” of the “developing” world, and how that manifests through the commercialization of holidays. But there would be no fun in that (lol). Christmas was definitely more relaxed in my home. We had a Christmas tree, but I didn’t wake up at the crack of dawn to the screams of my host nephew opening gifts. I guess part of that has to do with the lack of popularity of Santa and his gift giving tendencies. A PCV friend of mine who is Latina explained that the concept of Santa isn’t as popular within Latinx culture, which makes a lot of sense. As a result Christmas really felt like any other day of the year to me. In a way it kind of helped with the home sickness I expected to feel. If my host family had gone all out to celebrate Christmas, it would have reminded me of how we celebrate at home. But you better believe I was blasting Parang all day!!!

New Years

New Years is supposedly a big deal in Cartagena. I was told that tourists come from all over to spend their last night of the year in El Centro and Getsemani (pretty sure I spelled that wrong). I definitely believed all the hype as I tried to find lodging for the holiday. Literally every hotel in the area was booked with no openings available. I was starting to get worried that I would have to spend the New Year at site. While that wouldn’t have been horrible, it’s one of my traditions to spend the New Year partying. In the end everything came through when a PCV friend was able to hook us up with a hotel outside of Cartagena. We spent a few days in a cute little hotel with a pool, and most importantly, free wifi!!! For New Years Eve we went down to El Centro and met up with a group of other PCVs. We roamed around the city for a while, and somehow found ourselves on the wall (that surrounds the Centro) for fireworks. There was no official countdown, and definitely no ball drop, but it was still loads of fun. We made it back to the hotel early in the morning, passed out for a few hours, and got up for a new adventure. A group of us went to a finca (farm) where we relaxed and ate sancocho del campo. It’s a type of soup that is chock full of delicious bits of food. It’s presented on big banana leaves with a pile of the bulk of the soup (potatoes, yucca, corn on the cob, beef chunks) in the middle. Then there are big pots on either end of the table filled with the broth. We were all given calabash pieces to eat with. Basically you scoop out broth with the calabash, and pick out food from the center of the table, then eat it all together. It was definitely yummy!

I have a lot of dates to look forward to. This Monday will be my first official day with the students in my school, February 27^th will mark 6 months in country, and soon after I will turn 23 on March 17^th. Can’t wait!

100 Days in Colombia

As of today (December 5^th), I have been living in Colombia for 100 days. I’ve completed a grueling training, moved into my permanent site, and observed a few classes at my new school. I am very proud to have made it here—it has not been that easy. Ever since the first few days of moving in I’ve been on an emotional rollercoaster. I’ve decided to share some of those feelings on this blog for several reasons. I am not an emotional person by far so making the decision to publicize my feelings has been a difficult one. However, I hope to use it as an accurate representation of where I am in my service right now. Maybe if current PCVs/PCTs from other countries are reading this, they will be able to relate to me. Maybe people considering joining the Peace Corps will read this and understand how difficult service can be. Either way I hope that in the future I can read this blog knowing that I have grown from the place I’m in now.

 Some days I wake up in the morning and want nothing more than to hop on the next plane to Bradley Airport. From my site I can hear planes overhead flying out of the Cartagena airport, and I wish it were me on board. I cherish going to sleep every night where I get to dream about my family and friends, people who I probably won’t see for another two years. Waking up from those dreams are the worst. For the first few moments post sleep I get to live the false reality of the dream. But then I quickly realize that I am nowhere near my friends and family, and won’t be for a while.

In Colombia I find myself crying at the most random times. Anyone who knows me knows how big of a deal that is. The first time it happened I was on my site visit to Cartagena, and I was spending the night at my counterpart’s house. I was getting ready for the night and putting my hair in Bantu knots because it had finally grown out enough since my last haircut. I realized that the last time my hair was long enough to do Bantu knots was during my last semester of college. That’s when the tears started to roll. At Spelman every night I would put my hair in Bantu knots in the company of my friends. It was nothing major really, just a time when we all sat and talked together about an array of things. I cried that night because I knew those memories could never be re-created. Not only was I far away in Colombia, but I had also just graduated, so I would never find myself in that situation again. I don’t know why but that realization shook me. Most of the other times I’ve cried have happened while listening to music.  A song will come up on my shuffle that will trigger some memory that brings me to tears. As the Christmas season has been approaching, the tears tend to happen more when listening to Parang (Trinidadian Christmas music). This will be my first Christmas away from family, and that realization has been nothing short of difficult.

Sometimes I really do question why I am here. I wonder if I made the right decision to dedicate two years of my life to the Peace Corps. I don’t think I really considered how long two years is during my application process. Everyone swears that the time will fly by but I can’t help to think that my life is going by in slow-mo. It feels like years have gone by since staging in Miami; to think that that was only 3 months ago is mind boggling. I find myself playing the time game. Like when you’re in a 90 minute class and you want nothing more than to leave. You’ll go “ok 90 minutes is only 3 sets of 30, or 6 sets of 15 and 15 minutes have already passed so I only have to sit through 5 more sets of 15!” I try to break up my service into livable chunks. For example, the 200 days (about 6 months) in Colombia mark will happen right around my birthday. The 10 month mark will happen in the “summer” when I hope I can get some visitors. In august c2-7 will arrive, and in December I’ll be home for Christmas. Playing that game has really helped me get through some rough times.

I don’t want this post to sound depressing. I am grateful for many things about Colombia. I have an amazing host family in my new site. They are warm, friendly, and do everything possible to make me feel welcome. Spending time with them really lifts my spirits. Getting to know C2-5 volunteers has also helped me put my life in perspective. They’ve all survived one year in Colombia, and can probably all relate to how I’m feeling now. My new friends in C2-6 are always there for me, and when we’re all together everything feels right. I am also thankful for the opportunity to even be here. I know that I’m going through a rough time right now, but I am still glad to be here. There are people who never get to fulfill their dreams of being in the Peace Corps, and I try to never forget that.

 During training we all got a sheet that graphed out the stages that PCVs go through during their service. The graph consists of a straight horizontal line with another line on top of it that dips above and below the horizontal line at certain points. The curves represent how the PCV is projected to feel, with dips below being rough patches and, rises being good moments. It gives me peace of mind to know that the graph projects me to be in a dip from now (month 3) to about month 6 (March). It somehow gives my feelings validation, knowing that I’m not crazy for feeling how I’m feeling right now. I just hope that by month 6 I have risen from this low point and have a more positive outlook.

Writing this blog, and keeping a journal has been very therapeutic for me. I never knew that I would become a “feelings person” (lol), but I have welcomed the changes I am already seeing in myself.

 

PS Mom if you read this don’t freak out! I will be fine.

Site Placements!

Another month has flown by! It feels like I have already experienced an entire lifetime. I can’t imagine how I will feel one year from now. It seems to me like time moves much slower whenever I leave the US—but much faster at the same time. My three months in Rwanda felt more like a year abroad. I once heard someone in our group say that in PC Colombia “the days are long and the weeks are short” (or something to that affect). Sometimes I feel as if the days here will never end! Waking up at 5:00am everyday (and mind you I am NOT a morning person), spending my 8am-5pm in training, returning home by 6pm, and passing out at 9pm, can be quite lengthy and exhausting. But somehow it seems that I wake up on Monday morning, then all of a sudden it’s Saturday night. If Peace Corps years are anything like college years, my time will be up before I know it. I still don’t know if that’s a good thing or not.

Site Placement

Part of my commitment to the Peace Corps requires me to live and work in a community (either in/around Barranquilla, Cartagena, or Santa Marta) for two years. After two months of having this very important day looming over us, site placement day finally came! Understandably, everyone was pretty stressed out when it was time to find out our fates. While we all pledged to be “flexible” with our placement, I’m sure that deep down everyone had one or two reasons why they preferred one site over another. From before I even landed in Colombia I knew that I wanted to be placed in Cartagena—primarily because I wanted to work within an Afro-Colombian community. Through my extensive (and at times obsessive) pre-departure research I found out that Cartagena was home the largest Afro-Colombian community on the coast. It seemed natural for me to work with this community. I saw it as a way to further my education and experience within the African Diaspora. I live in the States, I’m West Indian-American, and have already been to Africa. It was time for me to acquaint myself with Afro-Latino culture. In addition, I wasn’t too keen on staying in the constant hustle and bustle of Barranquilla.

Some people were secretive about their preferred placements. Others insisted that they would be fine with wherever they were placed. I told everyone from day one what my intentions were. So by site placement time, everyone knew exactly where I wanted to go and why. I also got the feeling that they were all silently rooting for me to get exactly what I wanted (like I was doing for them). The actual site placement “ceremony” was stressful. It began with one of the PC staff reading a name from a folder and revealing their placement. Then that person would pick another folder, read the name, the person would get up, and the staff would reveal their placement. I knew that there were around 19 Barranquilla sites (including small pueblos in the Atlantico region), 5 or 6 in Santa Marta, and 5 in Cartagena—it felt like the odds were not in my favor. My some stroke of bad luck I was one of the last names to be read off. My heart thudded in my chest with each reveal. I relaxed a little bit as more and more people got Barranquilla placements—it meant that I was less likely to end up there. But then there was only one more Cartagena site left, my site! One of my friends was snapping reaction photos of everyone after they got the news. I look more relieved than anything, the stress was real!

Site Visits

For two years I will be living and working in a smallish community outside of Cartagena city. After meeting our counterparts (the English educators that we will be working with throughout our service) the following Tuesday we all headed out to our respective sites for a three day visit. My site looks very different from any part of Barranquilla I have ever been in. Its more in line with the image that I (and I’m sure many others) had of what “real” Peace Corps looks like. As one of the few urban placements, PC Colombia is not the typical “secluded village in the middle of the bush”. In Barranquilla all of us have running water, electricity, and most of us have washing machines and wifi (which is definitely a luxury here). My site placement is much less developed and has a clearly visible income disparity to the Old City in Cartagena. However this did not make the community any less appealing. I got to visit the school on Wednesday to meet the students and some of the teachers. Everyone was very welcoming and made me feel right at home. I was also surprised and relieved to find out that there were two other volunteers from the US working in my school. So in addition to me, there are two World Teach Volunteers, and an Austrian foundation in the barrio. One of the only downsides is the heat. It’s even hotter than Barranquilla and my barrio is supposedly even hotter than Cartagena city. I’m going to be drinking a ton of water!

In less than a month I’ll be moving in and starting a new chapter in my life. I can’t wait!