5 Week Stretch



Making Johney Cakes for Mother's Day

Frame of my home

 I´m currently out of site after a five week stretch there.  I must say I think it was at least one week two long.  A lot of volunteers get out at least for the day to internet or a grocery store every two weeks, but I think three weeks is the ideal.  By the time I met up with my friends I was so ready and so happy to see them.  To have people to relate to, to process with, and to vent to.  Being so cut off from my family and friends, with cell phone reception a hour walk away, and the added difficulty of having enough minutes and battery to talk, makes my site both a blessing and a curse. It´s a very unique and humbleing experience to live so cut off from the world.  There is constant moments for reflection, hamaca, and getting closer with my community.  But it also must be balanced with my own personal sanity.  Which I realize now will require shorter stretches of time in my site without leaving, and more communication via phone.  I´m going to try and check my messages once a week so if you wish to leave a message please call 6487-6131.  I think this phone number is going to become my primary phone now so please try to reach me there.

My time in site has been very productive and intense.  I came back from Thanks Giving after a spout of Giardia and moved into another host family´s home.  So for the month of December I was living with one of four community  members who actually has a consistent income outside of welfare.  It´s a stark difference and only after having the ability to compare December with November was I able to realize just how difficult November had been.  Rather than ñame three times a day, I was getting a fried egg with fried bread (oholdra) for breakfast, multiple vegetables for lunch and dinner (though still always too much starch because all vegetables are tubers), and often fish or chicken´s neck or beef.  Its funny how chicken´s neck has become a delicacy for me down here so quickly.  I had a door with a lock on it, and a wooden bed built off the ground to protect me from the cockroaches-all things I did not have before.  I learned to simply pay $10 per week rather than come accross the difficulty I had last month after providing food.  And with this arrangement I felt more inclined to buy chicken neck or eggs throughout the month as an extra little gift, rather than being constantly asked for more money-I was able to provide more by choice rather than awkward obligation.  I enjoyed nightly cuentas historicas about the jackrabbit tricking the tiger or of the dog, how dogs became man´s best friend, how a dolphin saved a man by taking him on a ride on his back passed out over the course of three days.  Many stories my host father asked me to believe without doubting his word, no matter how impossible they sounded.  He is a great story teller though and a skilled wood cutter.

Hauling a 16 foot 4x4

That chainsaw will cut every board of my house

I have been accompanying my host father of this month into the jungle to cut the wood for my house.  I must say that I fear my house will at least result in 4 large fallen trees to be molded into lumber by Julian´s chainsaw, and then hauled out of the jungle by my community members only with the incentive of coffee and Johney Cakes (bread baked with coconut milk) as reward.  Its hard to have every element of help I need for my house require some food offering, but that is simply the culture here.  And the work they are doing, I can contest is extremely difficult because I am always right beside them experiencing it first hand.

One of my tougher moments over these weeks occured on Christmas day as I walked through a small town on my way to cell phone reception already feeling homesick and lonely.  I saw the casique (chief with very little modern political power) and asked him how he was doing.  He said fine but that his kid was sick with a hernia and yellow fever.  That the doctor had told him he needed to go to David to get him help but the man explained that there was no money to achieve this.  I saw his son sitting there uncomfortable and with the white´s of his eyes yellow and struggled with what I could say, do, or advise.  I talked to the dad about how a kid had died in his community 3 months before and how he really needed to do what he could to get his son help.  He told me more stories of others who had died from not getting to the doctor and then explained that the health worker he had seen for his son had also recommended candy in exchange for getting him help in David.  And over the last week I have tried to explain to him that the candy recommendation was second to real medical help, but he continues to buy candy claiming that its all he can do.  In some ways I already find myself becoming slightly aclimated to events such as these.  Knowing that I cannot be the one to lend or give the money, nor force kids to wash their hands after pooping, there is a part of me that looks at the state of these people and echos their claim of "this is just how it is."  But when I take a step back and explain what I just saw to family or friends, or process these moments with other volunteers it becomes so evident how horrific much of what we are seeing is.  That things should not be this way and that change must come.  After talking to my mother and reading I believe that this boy did not have yellow fever but more likely Hep A after poop to mouth contamination.  Which yet again proves the importance of proper sanitation and hygiene.  When I left the family said the boy was getting a little better and I have tried to provide whatever advice I can from my where there is no doctor medical reference book, and will continue to check in on him.

Favorite moment over my entire time living in Playa Balsa was when I went to the finca to harvest with my host brother and sister and met a medical man deep in the jungle who was working on his pineapple plantation.  When he saw me he immediately began beaming and smileing largely, signaling for us to come to his home.  There his wife worked on making michila (cooked mashed ripe bananas of some sort with coconuut milk).  They gave us all michila, me with the largest, drinking from the gord.  Everything my host brother explained to me from how Ngabes used to only drink and eat from gords as plates, bowls, and cups, or that the michila was made from maduro platanos cuadrados the husband and wife would immidiately hand me as a gift.  " Take this gord, here take these platanos cuadrados, this yampi (purple root vegetable).  He showed me what each plant could be used for that were planted around the house and explained to me that he used to live out here before a family member´s baby died out there three years before.  So he moved closer into "town."  They were the sweetest peoiple and that night I wrote in my journal that if ever I question humanity to remeber the generosity and kindness of these two.  It was a beautiful day. 

Making Michila

Women's Map